My Sun, Your Rain
by listeninggame
Summary: Lucy Weasley is timid and Lucy Weasley is shy and Lucy Weasley is up to here with Carson Avery and his antiquated pureblood beliefs. When she acts on her hatred, however, she lands them both in detention every day for a month. Unsurprisingly, with so much time together, feelings start to change. Check it out if you have a penchant for Beauty and the Beast. (PREVIOUSLY called Bully)
1. Carson Picks a Fight

**Hey, Harry Potter fandom. It's been a while and I wanted to upload something, so I put up some old work, the beginning of what was going to be a full story. Just a little something from my original headcanon world of next gen Harry Potter that I called Stars in the Sky, if anyone remembers. Anyway, enjoy reading!**

* * *

"Oh, come on now, Lucy! We're going to be late!"

Lucy turned away from the shop window and yelled back, "Coming!"

She pulled her Hufflepuff scarf tighter around her neck and, taking one last glance at the necklace on display, ran towards her friends.

Hugo grabbed her arm as she slipped on a piece of ice. She steadied herself and smiled at him. Shaking his head, he chided, "You really ought to be more careful."

"I'm just not used to all this ice," she replied, shivering.

Hugo rolled his eyes and opened a side of his jacket. She smiled gratefully and stepped closer to him, allowing him to wrap it around her. She looked over at Louis, who walked on her other side and asked, "Is it always this cold?"

"No," Louis said, "It can be warm. You should know. We've been going to Hogwarts for six years."

"Yes, but I'm not here over the summer. Is it cold then, too?" Lucy asked, drawing her black and yellow hat over her ears. She regretted wearing a bun today; her neck was freezing.

"No, not necessarily," said Hugo.

"Hey!" Roxanne greeted as she bounded up to her friends outside of Dervish and Banges, shopping bags swinging at her side.

"Where have you been?"

Louis was glaring at Roxanne. Roxanne, who was tall enough to be at eye level with him, simply smiled and stuffed her hands in her pockets. Louis didn't leave it there though.

"Why weren't you with us? These two nerds dragged me to all these bookstores all day. If you had been with me, we could have tipped the scale and gone to Spintwitches or something!"

Roxanne just shrugged and went on walking with a secretive smile on her face. Lucy was curious, but she left the matter alone.

A sudden force pushed her off of her feet. She felt her and Hugo disconnect as she hit the snowy ground. Lucy sat up slowly and gently rubbed her head. Looking up, she saw that Hugo was already on his feet. He stood in front of her, blocking her view of whatever had knocked them over.

Hugo was yelling, "What was that for?!"

A cool and haughty voice replied, "That was for being the child of a blood traitor and Mudblood."

Oh... yeah. She knew who it was. Roxanne gasped and from Lucy's seat on the ground, she watched her face turn red with anger. Huffing in frustration, Lucy pushed herself off the ground. She walked over to Hugo and stood on the tips of her toes to see over the tall boy's shoulder. He was too tall, so, instead, Lucy tried looking over Louis's shoulder. She was correct in her assumptions.

"It's bad enough that we have a halfblood son of a blood traitor in Slytherin. Now we have his sister and her filthy family roaming the halls of Hogwarts? This is just disgusting."

"Avery, you make me sick!" Louis yelled. Lucy walked around him and stood at his side.

Carson Avery's dark eyes landed on her, and he grinned sinisterly. Smiling, he laughed, "Oh, look! It's the child of a blood traitor and a Muggle!" Lucy lifted her upper lip in a disgusted snarl. Speaking slowly as if to a dog, Carson commanded, "Down, girl. Down."

"You leave her alone!" exclaimed Roxanne. She took a step toward him. Avery and his cronies took an unconscious step away from the tall, intimidating athlete. Roxanne smirked.

Trying to cover up his falter, he sneered and said, "Like I'd listen to the daughter of a blood traitor. You're all filthy! You're the spawn of blood traitors!"

Lucy leaned over and whispered in Louis's ear, "What is a blood traitor anyway?"

Louis whispered back, "Purebloods who associate with Muggles and stuff."

Avery looked at her oddly. Lucy glared at him. After a moment of silent glaring, Hugo spoke up with a sort of tired voice, "Get out of here, Avery."

Avery hadn't looked away from Lucy. She took a tiny step behind Louis's arm and Avery seemed to realize he was staring at her. He snapped back to Hugo, "You can't speak to me that way, Filth."

Instead of turning red and flustered like his dad would, Hugo coolly replied, "Get a life, Avery, and stop butting into ours."

Glaring, Avery and his friends stomped away. Louis turned to Lucy and asked, "Are you okay?"

"What?" Lucy asked, confused, "Of course. Why wouldn't I be?"

Louis looked at the receding figure of Avery and then back at her.

"Did something happen that you aren't telling us?"

Now Hugo and Roxanne were watching her, too, just as confused as she was. "Louis, what are you talking about?"

"Stay away from Avery, okay?"

"Louis, what are you talking about?"

He repeated with more force, "Just stay away from him."

Lucy took a step back and held her hands up in defense, "Okay, okay. I'll stay away from him. Jeez."

"Let's get back to the carriages," Hugo said. They all followed him back to where the carriages usually bring them back to the castle. They rode in silence up to the castle.

* * *

"So you're telling me that you don't have dates to the Yule Ball?" Gianni Zabini looked between his two friends in disbelief.

Carson rubbed the back of his neck and answered, "Well, they are so hard to find and-"

"How did you have a date for the Halloween dance, but not for the Yule Ball?!" Gianni exclaimed, cutting him off.

"Girls are just too fickle," Marcus Travers replied, crossing his arms.

Gianni exclaimed in disbelief, "Carson, don't you have a girlfriend?!"

"Shhh!" Carson looked around warily to make sure none of the other people sitting in the Three Broomsticks heard his friend's outburst. Turning back to Gianni, he whispered, "That is just a title for our parents. She can go with whoever she wants. I don't care."

"You don't care about what?"

The three boys looked at the short-haired girl who had just taken a seat next to Gianni. She was beautiful with olive skin, dark eyes, and an upturned nose. She quirked a black eyebrow at the trio and slid her slanted eyes over each of them looking for an answer.

Carson replied, "Whether or not you have a date to the Yule Ball."

"Oh, ha, ha," the girl deadpanned, giving him a withering look, "Carson Avery, you better take me to the Yule Ball or, so help me, I will-"

"What?" Carson taunted, smirking, "You'll do what, Cerise?"

"Don't sass me, Carson," Cerise said, smiling and shaking a finger in his face, "If you had let me finish, you would know that I will cut off your nose, stuff it with Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, and stick it to the end of Messua Thomas's braid."

Carson raised an eyebrow at her. She smirked as they stared in silence. Madame Rosmerta walked up to the table and asked them how they were faring.

Flashing her a charming smile, Carson replied, "I'd be faring much better if you'd share a drink with me."

Rosmerta glared at him and said, "Cheeky boy."

"You know what's cheeky-"

"Thank you, Carson!" Cerise exclaimed, cutting him off, "For that wonderful visual. No, thank you, Madame Rosmerta, we're fine." The last was directed at the waitress. Nodding to Cerise and glaring at Carson, Rosmerta walked over to the next table.

Cerise glared at Carson. He just smiled. Taking a sip of his butterbeer, he said, "That was an awfully in-depth threat you gave earlier, Reese."

"I had to get my point across," she shrugged, taking a sip out of Marcus' butterbeer straw. Marcus turned a bright red at the thought of sharing a butterbeer with a pretty girl. He looked bewildered at Cerise and then to Gianni for assistance in the foreign situation and then back to Cerise.

Rolling his eyes at her, Carson reprimanded, "Reese, you know better than to pick on Marcus. He can't handle it."

"Handle what?" Marcus asked, looking over at Carson now.

Cerise answered for him, "Flirting."

Marcus looked shocked from Cerise to Carson and then back to Cerise. She had sat back down and faced away from him a bit. Stuttering in the slightest, he echoed, "Fl-flirting?"

"Say, Marcus?" Cerise asked, "You wouldn't mind taking me to the Yule Ball, would you?"

"T-take _you_? To the _Yule Ball_?" Marcus stuttered in shock.

"Well, yes," Cerise said, "Since Carson, _my boyfriend_ ," she glared at Carson, "won't take me, it couldn't do any harm if you did."

"Uh..."

"Great! I'll tell what tie to wear when I get my dress," Cerise exclaimed, jumping up from her seat. Leaning over the table again to kiss him on the cheek, she said, "You are the very best, Marcus. Bye, boys!" She flounced out of the Three Broomsticks without another word.

The three boys stared at the door she had just exited out of in silence. Gianni and Carson looked back at Marcus. Gianni had a wicked smirk on his face.

Marcus muttered, "What just happened?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Gianni said, grinning like a shark, "You just got a date to the Yule Ball with the hottest girl in Slytherin."

Carson argued, "Cerise is not the-"

"Think about it," Gianni persisted, cutting him off.

"Okay, so maybe she is," Carson said, "but she isn't all that great."

"Sure," Gianni said, rolling his eyes. Gianni looked past Carson's head and out of the window to the jewelry shop across the street. He smiled evilly.

Carson knit his eyebrows together in confusion. He turned around to see what Gianni was looking at and saw a blonde Hufflepuff peering into the jewelry shop window. When she looked up to answer someone, Carson saw her face. It was Lucy Weasley, and where there was one Weasley, a few more were sure to follow.

Carson and Gianni grinned at each other and left the Three Broomsticks, Marcus trailing behind. They watched as Roxanne ran out of that very same jewelry store, straight past them, to join Hugo, Lucy, and Louis.

* * *

 **Please review, even if you have nothing to say. Maybe just a smiley face or frowny face. And I can take flames.**


	2. Lucy Fights Back

_February 2, 2020_

Lucy finally snapped. That was it. That was the last straw. Sweet, timid, little Lucy had had enough. She marched up to Carson Avery, the meanest, foulest boy she had ever had the displeasure of meeting. She stopped about a foot from him so he was forced to put down his wand arm or he would have poked her.

She shouted, "I'm done with this!"

Carson's eyes widened; for once, Lucy wasn't predictable.

"I'm done. I'm done with _this_ , I'm done with _you_. I'm done with the stupid words you spew out to us like they actually mean something. I'm done with your stupid pureblood supremacy that you actually think will get you somewhere in life. I'm done with your stupid sneer that you use just to get under my skin."

Every time she said the word 'done' she took a tiny step closer until they were nose-to-nose. His eyes were wide with fright and she was glaring at him with all the anger she could possibly muster in one moment.

She whispered, "Well, guess what? Mission accomplished. You've bothered me to the breaking point. That means that this is the point where anything you say will make me wanna break you. And I probably will."

Carson was silent for a long time. Lucy didn't step back so they stood there nose-to-nose until he smirked and said, "You know, you're ugly when you're angry."

That was it. With a loud cry, Lucy tackled him to the ground. Carson shrieked as Lucy shoved him into the snowy grass. He couldn't see anything but blonde hair and small fists bombarding him from every direction. For a second, he saw snow and dead grass, which she had shoved his face into, and her eyes, which he previously thought were brown but were actually more of a greenish-brown. It reminded him of the dead grass that they were currently rolling around in. Filled with fire. That wanted to kill him.

Carson held his arms in front of himself, but Lucy didn't stop. She just hit his arms, too. He was amazed he could process so much when all he could see, hear, smell, taste, and feel was blonde hair and pain. But even with all his processing, he couldn't come up with a single solution to his problem. He'd heard of fist fighting, of course, but he'd never actually done it. And, no matter how uncouth and filthy she may be, Lucy was still a girl and you can't hit girls.

"Ms. Weasley! Mr. Avery!" shrieked a high voice. Carson felt Lucy's weight lifted off of him. Someone grabbed his arm— _tightly_ — and pulled him to his feet. Standing in front of him and Lucy with her arms crossed and a scowl on her face was Miss Trundle, a young teacher with blunt black hair and cold grey eyes. "What is the meaning of this?"

Lucy's wide eyes grew wider and she tried to stammer out an explanation. She looked like he had actually tried to fight back. Her hair was a complete mess, her tie was threatening to fall off, her shirt was partially untucked, and the blood from her skinned knee was slowly inching down her left leg. He didn't look much better. His hair was a mess, bruises were forming all over, his lip was cut, and his uniform looked like he had tried to get dressed in the dark while being attacked by a rabid badger.

Carson pointed his finger at Lucy, "She attacked me."

Lucy gasped and turned to him, "You started it! You set my quill on fire and called me a mudblood! Again!"

"Detention. For a month. Both of you."

"What?!"

Miss Trundle raised an eyebrow at their outburst. Lucy looked down and murmured, "Sorry, Miss Trundle."

Carson only glared.

"Meet me in my classroom at 7. Go visit Madam Pomfrey. Now," she commanded. Miss Trundle turned and stalked away.

Carson turned to Lucy.

"What the hell was that?!"

"It's dueling the Muggle way," Lucy said, pushing her hair out of her face.

"Well, your 'dueling' just got us a month-long detention," Carson said, walking back into the castle. She walked with him.

Lucy pulled a hair tie off of her wrist and pulled her hair up into a messy ponytail. She reached into one of her robe pockets and pulled out a pair of black, thick-rimmed glasses. She carefully inspected the glasses for any cracks or scratches. When she saw none, she breathed on the lenses so they fogged up and then wiped them with her robe sleeve.

"Since when do you wear glasses?"

Lucy looked up at Carson. He was cautiously looking at her out of the corner of his eye, trying to act indifferent. Lucy rolled her eyes and put the glasses on. She replied, "Since I ran into a pole in first grade."

"You don't wear them often."

Now he wasn't even looking at her but was looking straight ahead instead. She looked away from him and to the end of the corridor, eyes fixed on anything but him.

"Only in History of Magic, Transfiguration, and Astronomy."

"Really?" Carson looked at her in surprise, abandoning his effort to appear indifferent.

"I wasn't expecting you to notice," Lucy said, pushing the glasses up the bridge of her nose. "But, yes. I've had them the entire time."

"I've never seen you with them on," Carson argued. She still didn't look at him.

"Yes, you have," Lucy said. "But you never realized it. I don't blame you. With all that hot air in your head, it must be difficult to process things."

"Hey, that's not fair," Carson said.

She kept walking as she shot back, "You're not fair."

"What are you even talking about?" Carson asked, holding his hands up in exasperation.

"Shut up," Lucy snapped, speeding up.

Carson scowled but kept quiet the entire walk to Madam Pomfrey. The strict matron quickly mended their wounds, bruises gone and blood staunched. She instructed them to change into different uniforms and head back to classes which they did.

* * *

 **Hello, my beautiful readers! Thanks for actually going this far. This is so old I could cry. I was so young! Not really, this was little less than a year ago. But whatever, I've developed much since then and so have my characters. Not that much. I dropped Harry Potter last fall and I'm trying to pick it back up again, so encouragement would be nice. I didn't want to just leave this story. Theirs is a story made for words. Anyway, please review, and I'll see what I can do about a third chapter.**

 **Basically,**

 **listeninggame**


	3. Friends Find Out About Detention

_February 2, 2020_

Lucy sulkily pushed her food around her plate at dinner that night. Lily was chatter-boxing away, as usual, making the whole group laugh. Lucy had decided to sit with the Gryffindors that night. In some weird way, she reasoned it would toughen her up for her detention in an hour.

"What's wrong?" someone leaned over and whispered.

Lucy looked up into Matt's serious brown eyes. He was almost always serious. She shook her head and turned back to playing with her food. When she could still feel Matt's intense eyes on her, she looked back up and answered his question.

"I have a detention tonight."

Matt raised an eyebrow. Hugo, who had always been a good listener and was sitting directly across from them, overheard and asked, "So what? We've all gotten plenty of detentions before."

Lucy shook her head.

"Just me."

Now both of Matt's blunt eyebrows were raised, and Louis's attention was trained on her too.

"You don't have detention with any of us?" Hugo asked. This really did rarely happen, especially to her.

This called over Roxanne's attention, and Lily undoubtedly noticed when her audience disappeared.

"Didn't you hear?" Lily said haughtily to Lucy's right. "Sweet, little Lucy snapped during lunch today. You should have seen it."

Lucy twisted her mouth into a grimace and returned to her food.

"Wait, what do you mean?" Louis asked Lily.

Lily laughed as Lucy's face turned beet red. "Lucy attacked Carson Avery."

"What?!"

All eyes snapped back to her and Roxanne spit her food back onto her plate.

"Go, Lucy!" Louis cheered, hitting her on the back roughly. She jolted forward, and Matt grabbed her shoulder before she slammed into the table. He glared at Louis who only shrugged.

"Yeah, except I've got detention with him for the next month."

"What?"

This one was much quieter and much angrier than the first one.

Lucy buried her face in her hands and pleaded, "Please, don't do anything. You'll only make it worse."

The group just looked at her for a while before Louis offered, "We could break you out of there, Luce. We could do it without her ever knowing. We just-"

"I can handle this."

Lucy looked them all square in the eye one at a time ending on Matt.

"I can handle this," she repeated solely to him.

Matt nodded slowly. Looking up at the doors once, Lucy stood and said with the air of a man at the scaffold, "Well, it's time for me to go. I'll tell y'all about it tomorrow."

She grabbed her bag and with a last wave towards the table, she headed down to the dungeons to her imminent doom.

* * *

Carson looked up from his food towards the Gryffindor table that Lucy was leaving. He watched her dirty blonde hair swish behind as she walked out of the Great Hall.

"I have to go to detention now," Carson told his tablemates as he stood up. "I'll see you tonight."

Cerise laughed. "Oh, that's right. You have detention with that rapid little Fluffypuff."

Gianni patted him on the back. "Good luck, mate. And if she bites you, you're sleeping on the couch. I don't want to catch any of her diseases."

Carson gave him a withering look as he walked out of the Great Hall and into what would surely be the longest night of his life.

* * *

 **Yes, I know it's short. Sorry about that. But it is necessary filler. Honestly, this was never going to be a story. Just think of this as a three-shot. Chapter One was their previous relationship, Chapter Two was their relationship after Lucy grew a pair and decided to do something, and Chapter Three is how their friends feel about all this. It is my personal headcanon that in 2019 (the setting of this three-shot) Slytherins are much more laid back about life in general because, after a few years of groveling for forgiveness, they decided to pick up their dignity and not give a flying flippity-doo about everything. Another personal headcanon— pureblood Slytherins, or anyone raised by pureblood Slytherins, are possessive. Just a random thing because stuff.**

 **Wow, that was long, sorry about that.**

 **Basically, Lissy (my new handle because listeninggame is too long)**


	4. First Detention

_February 2, 2020_

Lucy watched the clock above Miss Trundle's desk tick lethargically. She had finished her paper about passive aggression an hour and a half ago, so now she just sat in silence staring at the clock while little balls of paper flicked against her temple from across the room.

She doubted he was actually done. He probably hadn't even started it. Miss Trundle was elbow-deep in paperwork and stopped paying attention to them all together once she started the second stack thirty minutes ago.

With a whiny huff, Lucy propped her chin up on the palm of her hand. Using her index finger to move the skin at the corner of her eye up, down, left, and right, she watched the clock's hands distort in different ways. She refused to look over at Carson and give him the satisfaction of knowing he was getting to her. Even though he really was. Every ball of paper that hit her head was another name added to her kill list. Funny thing is, all fifty names were Carson Avery. Fifty-one. Fifty-two.

Is there a unit of measurement for anger? If not, it should be Avery. It even rhymes with angry. For example, at the moment fifty-three Averys of rage were pounding through her blood. Fifty-four. Fifty-five.

She whipped her head to the left and spat out, "Will you give it a rest?"

Miss Trundle didn't look up, but Lucy lowered her voice anyway.

"I am trying not to murder you right now, but you are making it extremely difficult."

"Go ahead. Take a swing at me. You won't land a single one."

Lucy twisted her face up in anger.

"I did earlier."

"When I was surprised," Carson drawled out. "Let's see what you can do in a fair fight."

Lucy was torn but ultimately turned back to face the taunting clock.

"Too chicken, Weasley?" Carson taunted, and Lucy suddenly didn't mind the clock so much anymore. "No big scary redheads to hide behind today."

She felt her eye twitch. That was the first time her eye had ever twitched in anger. It felt uncomfortable.

"Longbottom isn't here to protect you. Weasley and Potter, Frenchy and Red? They're all tucked away in their tall Gryffindor tower."

Lucy covered her face with her hands.

"Where are your words now, Blondie? Where are your fists and your knives? Where'd all your courage go? It ran all the way back to its tall, tall tower, leaving you in the basement all on your own. What're you gonna do now, Blondie? You're all alone."

"That's enough!"

Miss Trundle, Carson, and Lucy all looked up in surprise at the door. Standing there was Albus Potter, normally pale face a bright Weasley red that he couldn't hide and bright green eyes fiercely angry.

Miss Trundle fumbled for words confusedly.

"Mr. Potter, what on Earth- what are you- why- what is the meaning of this?"

Albus glared at her so intensely that they could all hear her teeth clack together when she shut her mouth. He strode over to her desk and dropped a paper down on her stack.

"I was coming to bring my late homework. I believe detention is over, is it not?"

Miss Trundle looked at him, eyes still wide, and then over at Carson and Lucy, both confused and one with eyes brimming with tears. As if he had planned it, Miss Trundle's wand started ringing, signaling that detention was, in fact, over. The clock even agreed, although Lucy could have sworn she had fifteen minutes left.

"Well, then I'll just be taking Lucy."

With long, confident strides Albus strode over to her desk, grabbed her around her bicep with long, spindly fingers, and hoisted her out of her seat. Albus pulled Lucy out of the room, but not before fixing Miss Trundle and Carson with a penetrating glare that left them both pinned to their spots.

Albus pulled Lucy out into the hall and Carson quickly followed, heading straight for the Slytherin dungeons. Before he could actually get anywhere though, Albus had him pinned against the wall.

"Listen to me very carefully, Avery," Albus whispered, leaning close to his face. "This girl right here," Albus pulled far enough away from Carson for him to see Lucy standing behind him hastily wiping her face so that the tanned skin was blotchy and red, "Her name is Lucy Weasley, and she is my cousin. If you ever hurt her again, I will end you. Understood?"

Carson nodded hastily. Albus let go of him and backed away from the wall.

Eyes flickering between Albus and Lucy, Carson spat out, "You got lucky this time, Weasley."

Before anyone could process what was happening, Albus' fist was slamming into the side of Carson's face. Carson stumbled away holding his red cheek. Albus shook his hand out slightly but didn't stop staring murderously at him. Carson turned tail and ran.

Albus turned back to Lucy who was standing stock still in the same spot. She looked kind of scared but mainly surprised.

"Not a word of this to anyone," Albus told her. "I'm supposed to be the pacifist."

Lucy's lips quirked up in a small smile.

"Thank you, Al."

The seventh-year shrugged his shoulders.

"No problem. I'll walk you back to your dorm."

Lucy nodded and started walking with him. She often complained about being babied by her overprotective cousins because she was the youngest, but sometimes it's not half bad.

* * *

 **Okay, so apparently there is a fourth chapter that no one bothered to inform me about until I was done writing it. Here's what happened in detention. And after detention. Yeah, I know, Lucy let's other people fight her battles. Everyone is entitled to a flaw. We can't all be Gryffindors. And no, Albus is not usually hotheaded. Most of the cousins get violent when Lucy's involved. She's the baby of the family. Hope you liked it.**

 **EDIT: Just corrected a few things.**

 **Basically, Lissy**


	5. First Trip to the Tower

_February 6, 2020_

It was their fifth detention of doing nothing but cleaning the room while Trundle graded papers and Carson was bored. He had barely finished scraping the gum from the first desk. Lucy was almost done her row and was near the back of the classroom. The only sounds in the room were the gum scrapers grating on the underside of the desks and Trundle's quill scratching across the parchment. And then the squeaking of Trundle's chair as she pushed away from her desk.

"Oh, no!" Miss Trundle exclaimed, looking up at the clock. She hastily grabbed a few papers scattered around her desk and ran to the door. She apparently remembered last minute that she had two charges because she looked back at the two of them and ordered, "Stay here. I need to turn these papers in before- goodness, I'm late!"

She flew out the door in a flurry leaving Carson and Lucy standing there with an open door.

"Come on. Let's go," Carson said, after a second of silence. He strode towards the open door with the full intention of leaving when a hand grasped his elbow. He looked at Lucy over his shoulder, eyes wide and gum scraper held tightly in her other fist.

"You can't just leave."

You'd think he had suggested something crazy with the way she was looking at him. Carson shrugged her off. Her hand dropped to her side.

"Why not? I'm bored."

"But- but we're in detention," Lucy argued. "You're supposed to be bored."

"Well, I don't want to be bored. So we're leaving."

Carson took a step towards the door. Lucy took a step back.

"We?"

"I can't have you snitching on me, can I? You're coming with me."

She looked like he had slapped her mother with her pet fish.

"I am _not_ a tattletale."

Carson rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Now come on."

Lucy crossed her arms and set her face determinedly.

"You can't make me."

Carson glared.

"I bet I could carry you over my shoulder."

To prove his point he started reaching towards her. Her eyes widened comically again.

"No, no. Okay. I'll come with you."

He smirked smugly as he held the door open and gestured for her to go.

"Ladies first."

She sent her signature nasty snarl his way and walked out into the hall. He grinned triumphantly and followed her out the door.

* * *

"Avery, where are we going?"

He had been leading her in the same direction Trundle had gone in for the past five minutes. They were no longer in the dungeons, but walking to the above floor.

"We're going too far away."

He disregarded her and kept going forward. She looked behind her longingly as they turned up two flights of stairs.

"What if she comes back soon?"

He ignored once again and instead walked ahead six paces. She rushed to keep up with his longer strides. They were now openly strolling the school. Every shadow was Filch coming to get them.

"This is risky. We shouldn't be doing this. Carson-"

"Lucy, would you shut up?"

She looked up at him, startled. His face was frustrated and avoiding eye contact with her. She frowned and looked ahead as well. They continued to walk in silence until she found herself at the base of a tower.

"The Astronomy Tower? Why?"

His pointed look stifled the questions rising up her throat. Giving one last look to the empty hallway as if she could see Miss Trundle walking into her empty potions classroom, Lucy followed Carson's retreating figure up the stairwell all the way to the top of the tower.

He was sitting by the railing with his feet dangling over the edge when she made it to the top. She didn't really know what to do, so she just stood awkwardly near the middle of the tower.

A blue glow from Avery's direction pulled her attention back to him. He was charming a paper airplane and then throwing it off of the Astronomy Tower. She followed it with her eyes until she couldn't see it anymore. He pulled another piece of paper and scrawled something on it. He folded this paper into an airplane too, and, after charming it under his breath, threw it into the night sky with the other. She followed this one with her eyes like she had the last. When the plane faded from view, she looked back to see Carson with another charmed airplane in his hand aimed at the sky. He threw it forward to join the other paper airplanes in the black oblivion.

He stood and dusted off his pants. She just stared at him from her place near the middle that she had never moved from.

Carson nodded towards the stairs leading back down to the school.

"Let's go."

She stared for a second more before nodding stiltedly and rushing down the steps. He followed behind her in a weary, world-worn way in stark contrast with the determined, angry gait he used to get there.

* * *

They made it there mere seconds before Miss Trundle did. Miss Trundle entered the classroom as quickly as she left it. She made no effort to hide the surprise on her face when she saw both students underneath the desks, scraping away at the gum.

Carson tried not to look too proud of himself when Trundle inspected the clean undersides of the desks he had spelled clean seconds earlier.

"Yes, well, it seems you have completed the desks."

She muttered more quietly to herself, "It took them five days, but they got it done. What will they do tomorrow? Should they write? I'll have them write. That way I'll have time to come up with some more tasks."

Carson groaned long-sufferingly, shocking Miss Trundle out of her head.

"Oh, yes, well, detention is over. You both may leave."

Carson shouldered his bag and brushed past Lucy into the hall and down to the Slytherin dungeons.

* * *

 **I feel like such a tease right now. Sorry, not sorry. Don't know if I will continue this. Most of the time when I say I do, I don't, so I don't know. I'm just going to keep playing this by ear.**

 **Basically, Lissy**


	6. Second Trip to the Tower

_February 7, 2020_

The next night saw Lucy and Carson writing again, this time on the topic of active aggression. Lucy was near done and Carson hadn't even touched his, not even to write his name. There were thirty minutes left of detention and Miss Trundle was scribbling on her papers, her stack slowly sinking lower. Miss Trundle started to distractedly gather papers while watching the clock.

"Okay, I'm going to turn these papers in. I'll be back very soon. Do not leave this room," Miss Trundle instructed. Carson listened for the clacking of her heels to fade away before standing from his desk and walking to the door. Lucy looked up from her paper startled.

"Are you leaving again?" Lucy asked. "You really shouldn't. You could get in trouble."

"You'd better pray I don't, because you're coming with me."

"Carson, no-"

"Yes. I can't have you telling the teacher that I've been gone and where I've been. You're coming with me."

His voice was firm, but she was stubborn.

She reiterated her statement from last night. "I am _not_ a tattletale."

"I have evidence to believe otherwise, so let's go," Carson argued. He held the door for her like he had last time and gestured grandly out the door.

Lucy groaned, but stood from her desk and walked out of the room. This time for the entire walk Lucy was silent. She was able to keep up because Carson was distracted and she already knew where they were going.

She walked up the steps of the Astronomy Tower first with Carson directly behind her. When they reached the top, he shouldered past her and took the same place he had been in last night. Lucy once again stood awkwardly in the middle.

Carson pulled out a piece of paper and started writing on it. She watched him write. He pursed his lips when he wrote like Molly did, but she slightly skews her mouth to the right. He only wrote a few words, barely a whole sentence, she was sure. His pale fingers worked quickly to fold it into a paper airplane like it was muscle memory. He pulled a long, dark wand out of his robe pocket and swirled it around the plane, poking it in different places. His lips formed words she could neither recognize nor hear from where she stood. A blue glow followed the wand and stuck to the plane where he poked it. With a flick of his wrist, the faintly glowing plane flew off into the sunset.

She watched him pull out another paper and scribble a single word on it before folding and charming it like he did the last. This plane followed the other out to the horizon. Carson pulled out a third paper. Lucy watched the quill waiting for it to move. After a few seconds of the quill just sitting on the parchment, she noticed that the hand clutching the quill was pale white. She looked up at Carson's face. His eyes were screwed shut tightly and his head was resting on the bar in front of him. He looked liked he was in pain.

He opened his eyes when the quill snapped in his fist. She jumped back at the sudden sound. He frustratedly threw the broken quill over the railing and watched with clenched teeth as the two pieces spiraled down, down, down the side of the tower

They stood there like that for a good while, Carson with his head in his hands, fingers fisted in his hair, and elbows on his knees and Lucy with her eyes still wide and one foot a step behind the other ready to flee. His angry face fell to be replaced with a distraught look that made Lucy's heart throb. She will always blame her Hufflepuff nature for her next action.

Reaching into her robe pocket, her fingers landed on her quill. She hesitated for a split second before pulling the quill out of her pocket and forcing her feet forward. In his forlorn state, he didn't notice her standing beside him. It wasn't until the tip of her quill brushed the black hair he had tangled his fingers through that he looked up. He pulled back to look at the quill she was holding out in front of him, hands sliding down to his lap. His eyes followed the stem of the quill up her arm to meet her eyes. She thought she should say something or maybe smile, but she just stared. He looked confused.

His hand tentatively reached up to grab the quill from her hand. She let go and dropped her hand once his thumb and pointer finger closed around the brown feather. He pulled it down to his lap and twirled it around his fingers a bit before dipping it in the tiny inkwell next to him. He sat for a second with the quill hovering over the parchment.

Lucy looked over her shoulder at the steps leading out of the tower, extremely tempted to leave. Then she sat down next to him. He watched her sit in his peripheral vision. She watched the quill softly touch the paper and then write out a single word. _Quill_.

She observed with interest as he folded the paper into a third plane. His wand swirled around it again, whispering those words that she could never hear before. It sounded like Wingardium Leviosa but he pronounced it strangely. _Incorrectly_ , her Aunt Hermione's voice chimed in her head.

The wand glowed blue, something the levitation definitely did not include, and wherever he poked the paper plane with the wand glowed a spot of blue. His poking seemed random, but his concentration made it seem practiced. The plane sailed through the railing's bars off into the last light of sunset. She rested her chin on the bar in front of her and watch the plane until she couldn't see it anymore. He did the same.

When the sun had entirely sunken behind the mountains, Carson stood quickly. Lucy, surprised, stood too, albeit a little more clumsily. Her knees cracked from sitting in the same position for so long.

Carson roughly shoved the quill into her hands.

"We have to be fast if we want to get back before she does."

He ran quickly down the stairs. Lucy took a second to find her bearings before following him.

* * *

Carson walked out of the bathroom already changed for bed and drying his hair with a towel. Gianni, who was asleep when Carson got back from detention, was sitting on the bed reading.

"Have fun?"

Carson glared and threw the wet towel at his friend. Gianni laughed softly.

"No need to get all huffy about it. How's Weasley? Still a little ray of sunshine?"

Carson grumbled something incoherent and crawled under the covers.

Gianni whispered, " _Nox_ ," and climbed into his bed. He was quiet for a while, but then he said into the darkness, "I saw a paper plane fly by the window earlier."

"How weird," Carson muttered.

"Are you okay, mate?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Don't worry about it."

* * *

 **Okay, so to be completely and entirely honest, I have no clue where this story is going. But I like writing it. Miss Trundle is not the best supervisor in the world. And, gosh darn it, Lucy, stop being such a doormat. Headcanon time: Molly is poet and she loves writing, but she's studying to be a doctor right now because there are little to no jobs in poetry.**

 **Also, some shameless self-advertisement: Shout out to all my PJO fans in the crowd! I have a short story called Demigodlings about the kids of Percy and his friends. What I write is determined by a poll on my profile, so if you all could go vote, it would make my life awesome.**

 **Basically, Lissy**


	7. Fight in the Tower

_February 8, 2020_

Saturday detention was absolutely terrible like all detentions should be. Miss Trundle made them finish their essays, or start it, in Carson's case. Lucy tried to focus on her essay, but her mind kept floating back to what had happened that afternoon.

She had planned to just spend the day at the lake with Lily like she did most Saturdays. Roxanne would have come if Gryffindor weren't so obsessed with winning the upcoming Quidditch match. Since Roxanne was absent from their girls' day, the two had jumped at the chance to just sit by the lake, instead of the exploring and adventuring Roxanne usually made them do.

 _"Godric, this is the best," Lily sighed as she snuggled into her robes._

 _Lucy nodded in agreement. The cold wind that whipped her hair around and bit at her nose had chased most of the Hogwarts inhabitants back indoors, but she enjoyed the chance to just sit and catch up with one of her best friends/cousins by the lake._

 _"So how are my lion friends?" Lucy asked._

 _Lily shrugged and picked at the grass. "It's good, I guess. Louis' been doing what Louis does, which is every girl that moves." After a pointed look from Lucy, she added, "Every girl that moves and is not related to him."_

 _Lucy laughed softly._

 _"That narrows it down to about one-third of the school."_

 _Lily laughed loudly._

 _"True!"_

 _"So how's Roxy been doing? She keeps missing Saturdays."_

 _Most Saturdays now consisted of all-day Quidditch practice for the Gryffindors._

 _"Greg's angry," Lily answered exasperatedly. "He's been pushing the team super hard because he and Roxy have been arguing."_

 _"Over what?"_

 _"Nothing, as usual. Roxanne is just so blind," Lily responded with a dismissive flip of her hand._

 _Lucy scrunched up her nose. "What do you mean?"_

 _Lily's eyes darted from side-to-side and then she leaned towards Lucy conspiratorially. She whispered in a voice thick with_ chisme _, "Greg so obviously has a crush on her. She's oblivious to it and he doesn't know how to deal with any emotions not related to Quidditch, so he keeps lashing out every time he gets jealous or frustrated. Roxy, of course, keeps fighting him on everything because he's been very unfair to the whole team lately and she has no clue that she's the reason. It's all one big mess."_

 _Lucy's mouth made a small 'oh.' Lily leaned away from her again. "But you didn't hear it from me."_

 _"It sounds like you have a lot of drama going on in Gryffindor," Lucy remarked._

 _Lily nodded. "Oh, we do. And for once, it has nothing to do with me or Louis. Remember Genevieve? Yeah, well, apparently, Bobby had a fling with her this summer. According to Bobby, that is. But it's February and he's only bringing it up now, so I don't know if this is another scheme to mess with Hugo or what. You know how he's always messing with Hugo. And Matt and Leila are thinking about breaking up. Apparently, she doesn't like how close he is to you. You also didn't hear that from me..."_

 _Lucy, who already knew most of this, had stopped listening to Lily's prattling a while ago because a familiar shape flew across the overcast sky. She almost didn't see the white plane on the gray backdrop, but the blue glow set it apart. She looked up towards the Astronomy Tower. She couldn't see anyone from where she was seated at the lake, but she'd bet her right arm that an ill-tempered Slytherin was sitting up there sulking._

 _A part of her wanted to stay there by the lake with Lily and ignore her bully, but another part of her, the part of her that refers to him as Carson instead of Avery and that lent him her quill, wanted to go up to the Astronomy Tower and... well, she didn't really know what she wanted to do. She just wanted to go._

 _Her escape came when Albus, Scorpius, and Rose came over. Scorpius pulled Lily aside to whisper something in her ear, so Lucy quickly muttered an excuse to Albus and Rose and ran away._

* * *

 _"Hey."_

 _Carson recognized the accent, so he didn't turn around. He just sat there with his legs dangling over the edge and his chin and arms resting on the bar in front of him. Marcus' quill was in his hand and a small parchment was under his leg so that the wind wouldn't blow it away._

 _"What do you want?" he snapped harshly._

 _Lucy made no sound behind him. He could see her in his mind's eye just standing in the center of the tower staring at him like she does. It made him angry for some reason._

 _"I... don't know," came her reply, hesitant and confused._

 _He looked over his shoulder at her. She was wearing her robes closed with a Hufflepuff scarf, hat, and gloves. She looked ridiculously bundled for such normal weather._

 _"I just thought that-" Her eyes met his and suddenly her expression hardened. "Never mind. It was stupid."_

 _He sneered at her._

 _"You're stupid."_

 _"That was childish."_

 _"You're childish."_

 _"Why do you do this?" she complained_ _, complete with a foot stomp and everything._

 _He stood up to face her, making sure to grab the parchment under his leg before it was blown away._

 _"Can you leave?" he asked accusatorially. She crossed her arms, so he rolled his eyes. "Fine. I'll leave."_

 _He made to move towards the steps, but she slid in front of them._

 _"What is up with the airplanes?"_

 _"Move, or I'll make you move."_

 _"You can't keep dragging me up here to watch you throw paper off of a tower."_

 _Her hands were on her hips and her eyebrows were pulled low over her eyes. Her attempt to appear authoritative would have made him laugh if he weren't so angry with her._

 _He pointed a finger in her face. "I never asked you to come up here."_

 _"You did yesterday! And the day before that!"_

 _"To keep you from telling the teacher!"_

 _"What's gonna stop me now?!"_

 _"You left class with me, remember? You can't give me up without condemning yourself!"_

 _She shrieked, her foot stomping on the wood again. Her shoulders were hunched up near the edge of her hat, her elbows were locked straight by her side, and her gloved fists were curled into yellow and black balls._

 _"You can't keep making me do this!"_

 _"I never asked you to come up here!" he yelled in her face. Their close proximity reminded him of the last time he and Lucy were nose-to-nose; he had ended up with more bruises than he was comfortable with, so he leaned back a bit._

 _"Aaagh!"_

 _Her arms flew up in frustration. She turned around and crossed her arms, taking deep breaths to calm herself down._

 _"Leave me alone!" he bellowed._

 _She faced him again, hands fluttering down to brush down her skirt nervously, and she said in a lower, yet still angry and flustered voice, "Just- just tell me why. I've gotta know what I'm breaking rules for. You_ owe _me an explanation, Avery."_

 _He narrowed his eyes. How dare she. He leaned down and seethed through his teeth, "I don't owe you anything, Weasley."_

 _"I hate you!"_

 _With a swish of her robes, she flew down the stairs._

Carson looked at his finished essay. He had made Marcus do it earlier that afternoon after his screaming match with Lucy.

Gianni told him afterward that he had been walking up the stairs at the time of the argument and had heard it all. Lucy had almost barreled him over during her flight down the stairs. Gianni had then tried to get the details out of Carson, who had just angrily brushed past him and stormed down to the Slytherin dungeons.

"Okay, that's time. Get out of here," Miss Trundle announced. "Tomorrow meet me at 7 in the Great Hall. You will be dusting the candelabras."

Carson grabbed his bag and left the room quickly. Lucy hurried after him.

"Avery, wait."

He didn't wait though. He sped up. She stopped, turned around, and left.


	8. Late Night in the Tower

_February 9, 2020_

Sunday night Carson sat waiting in the Great Hall with Miss Trundle. Lucy was late and Ms. Trundle was impatiently pacing. Apparently, she had somewhere to be and would come back once detention was over.

The door creaked and Lucy slipped in. She was faintly blushing when she said, "Sorry I'm late. I lost track of time."

Miss Trundle was out of her seat before Lucy even finished speaking.

"You're excused. I told Carson what to do. Get to work."

Just like that, he and Lucy were alone in the Great Hall with two feather dusters and a whole lot of candelabras. Lucy nervously made her way over to him.

"So... what are we doing?"

Carson brushed past her like he had the night before. As he was opening the door, she asked, "Again?"

He didn't say anything, just stared at her while holding the door wide open. He left the grand sweeping gesture he usually did for another time.

She frowned, scrunching her eyebrows together. The bridge of her nose wrinkled, too. He noticed that she did that when she was confused. She would shrivel her face up like a raisin. Her mouth opened and then she puckered her lips together. He could feel her muddy green eyes searching his face, but his eyes kept a fixed point on her forehead where a freckle was partially folded into one of her worry lines, unwilling to give up any information.

Her mouth opened again and she asked, "Aren't we gonna dust the candelabras?"

He rolled his eyes and pointed his wand towards the nearest candelabra. With a muttered spell, the dust burst off like it was allergic to the candelabra. He gave Lucy a pointed look. She took the hint and scampered out of the door.

They started on the familiar path to the Astronomy Tower. Carson could see Lucy studying her clasped hands out of the corner of his eye. She was unusually subdued today, but then again, so was he. There must have been something about Sunday night.

They made it to the door to the Astronomy Tower in total silence, an impressive feat for a Hufflepuff. He held the door open for her and she placed her foot on the first step before turning around to face him.

She was biting her lip and she was looking at him through her eyelashes. _Honestly_ , Carson thought maliciously while subconsciously rolling his eyes, _this girl needs to grow a backbone_.

"You know, I didn't mean it when I told you I hate you yesterday. I'm sorry for saying that."

He could feel his eyes widen in surprise. He could normally keep his expression in check, but that was the last thing he had ever expected her to say. He stared at her, not knowing how to respond.

She continued, undeterred by his silence, "I want you to know that I don't hate you. I may really dislike you and the things you say and do, but I don't hate people. It's just not in my nature to hate. I was just angry."

He still said nothing, unsure of how he should react to a sincere apology. Should he reply in kind? He doesn't hate her, but that's only because he always thought of her as one of many, a smaller part of a much larger, loathsome family.

"That being said," she went on, eyes trailing off to the left before looking back at him full on, no eyelashes in the way or anything, just swampy green meeting frigid black, "I still wanna know what you make the airplanes for. Whether or not you may think it, you _do_ owe me an explanation."

Her last request snapped him back to his regular self. He was no longer floored by her apology and narrowed his eyes at her audacity.

"If you're just going to stand there talking and blocking the front step, I'm going to start heading up."

He brushed past her again, shoving her out of the doorframe with his shoulder, and proceeded up the steps. Once he reached the top, he took his normal spot by the railing and pulled out a paper and quill. He poised his quill ready to write and that's how the quill was when Lucy finally made it to the top as well.

She sat where she normally sat in the middle of the tower and watched him. He could feel her eyes on him and it made him feel irrationally angry. He couldn't think of anything to write and he couldn't stand the feeling of Lucy's eyes boring into the back of his head. She was angry at him, blaming him, and it made him angry at her, made him blame her for his inability to come up with anything.

After a few minutes of sitting there with his quill poised to write words that weren't in his head, the intensity of Lucy's eyes on his back faded till he could chance a glance over his shoulder at her.

She was lying down on her side with her face in the crook of one arm and the other arm wrapped around her stomach with her hand in her robe pocket. Her legs were bent so that she was close to being in the fetal position but not really. Her blonde hair was cascading over her face. She mumbled something and itched her nose where the hair was bothering her. Her breathing was steady and slow, quiet enough that he wouldn't be aware of it if he couldn't see her chest rising and falling.

His lips quirked up a little despite himself, but then his face fell again when he remembered the last thing he said to her. He wasn't feeling guilty. He couldn't be. He had been teasing Lucy for six years now and his treatment of her had never gotten to him before. Then again, he'd never called her Lucy before or ever even reflected on his treatment of her.

In the silence that came with Lucy falling asleep, Carson finally thought of something to write. Turning back to face the railing, he quickly scribbled the word silence onto the slip of parchment on his lap. Pocketing his quill, he started folding the paper into a plane. It was a Muggle invention, but he read a book about origami once and the plane was included. It was aerodynamic enough for the spell, a various of Wingardium Leviosa he invented that gave the plane perpetual flight until it reached a cloud, where it dissolved.

He poked the tip, wings, center, and two other random places on the plane with his wand, leaving glowing dots on the paper, taking a longer time with each dot than he normally would. He watched his wand moved languidly around the plane. Carson looked back over his shoulder again to make sure Lucy was asleep before flinging the paper over the railing. The plane sailed out into the now black sky and the blue glow made it look like there were just a few more stars out.

He didn't realize how late it had gotten. The windows of Hogwarts were all lit and the grounds were dark and empty. Miss Trundle would be heading back to the Great Hall anytime now.

Carson stood, ignoring the creaking of his bones after an hour of sitting, and walked over to Lucy. He had to wake her up or Miss Trundle would get there before them. Ignoring the guilt he felt for waking her up after making her come up here and then snapping at her— _What guilt? Carson Avery doesn't feel guilt_ — he gently shook her shoulder.

"Weasley. Weasley, wake up."

She mumbled something and buried her face deeper into her arm.

He shook her a little harder than before and whispered a little more loudly than before, "Come on. We have to get back."

Her eyes fluttered half-open before falling closed again. He thought she was going to fall back asleep, but she rolled onto her stomach and pushed herself up. She slowly stood to face him, eyes still closed and legs a little wobbly.

"Lucy, we need to go," Carson urged, grabbing her arm and tugging her forward. It wasn't until she tripped over her feet and knocked her forehead into his shoulder while still keeping her eyes closed that Carson realized she was half-asleep.

He tugged her upright and gave her arm a little testing pull. She swayed forward so he steadied her again. When he asked her to walk again, she only held out her arms and whined, "Carry me."

Carson groaned when he realized what he'd have to do. After a lot of difficulty and cursing, Carson got Lucy onto his back. His arms went under her knees and her arms immediately wrapped around his neck, head falling to his shoulder with a thud. Her slow and steady breathing on the side of his neck told him that she had fallen back asleep.

It was a struggle getting Lucy back to the Great Hall on time and mostly uneventful. Mostly. When she nuzzled her nose into the crook of his neck, he definitely did not turn bright red. That did not happen. And when her ankles hooked around his waist and she hugged him closer, the sound he made was because of how heavy she was— she was short and small but she was definitely not one of those stick girls— and not for any other reason. At all. He'll swear it on Salazar Slytherin himself.

When they finally did reach the Great Hall, he unraveled her limbs from around his body and put her down on a chair. He flicked his wand around the room and one-by-one the dust burst off the candelabras. He used another spell to clean all of the dust from the tables.

Not a second later, their absentee monitor ran into the room, bright red and breathless. He probably looked the same. Miss Trundle breathed out a sigh of relief. She might have meant to say it under her breath, but he heard her anyway when she muttered, "Oh, thank Rowena, they haven't murdered each other."

Her chin tilted up when she addressed him, no doubt because he was a head taller than her. "I see that you have finished dusting. Good. I'll see you both tomorrow night." Her grey eyes slid over to Lucy distractedly. "Wake her up, would you?"

Miss Trundle left just as quickly as she came. Carson was left with a sleeping Lucy for whom he went through so much trouble not to wake, now with the specific instructions from a teacher to wake her up. Before he could make a decision on whether to leave her there or wake her up, Longbottom poked his head through the door. Younger, male Longbottom, not older, female Longbottom.

"I came to get Lucy," he said in explanation, watching Carson disdainfully as he made his way over to Lucy. "She was supposed to sleep in Gryffindor Tower with Lily and Roxanne. Why didn't she come?"

Carson looked at the boy, alarmed at the sudden hostility in his voice for the last question. After a minute of hesitation under Longbottom's harsh glare, Carson answered lamely, "She fell asleep."

The boy snarled noiselessly. It reminded him of Lucy's expression of disdain. _They must spend a lot of time together_ , Carson mused.

"Obviously," Longbottom snapped, accusation and blame already lacing his voice. "But why? Lucy can't fall asleep when she has a job to do. And she doesn't use magic to complete detention tasks."

"Why would you think we used magic?" Carson retorted icily, careful of his wording.

Longbottom rolled his eyes.

"Please. The feather dusters are spotless and there is a ring of dust around each candelabra. Miss Trundle is an idiot if she didn't notice. I know Lucy wouldn't agree to this. So tell me why Lucy is asleep."

Carson racked his brain for an answer that wouldn't reveal what he really did during every detention.

"I spelled it before she could do anything. She fell asleep."

Longbottom stalked up to him, eyes narrowed and finger pointed at his chest.

"I know you're lying and if I find out you did anything to her, you're dead. You better not have touched a hair on her head, Avery."

Carson glared and pushed the boy away, pulling his face into an expression of disgust.

"Don't touch me. I didn't do anything to her, much less touch her."

Longbottom leaned back and scanned his face again with serious brown eyes before giving up his search for any sign of untruth and walking back to Lucy. He plucked her out of the wooden chair bridal style with a great huff. Her eyes fluttered half-open like they had when he had tried to wake her up in the Astronomy Tower.

"Matt?" she whispered with a small smile.

He nodded with a similar smile as her head fell onto his chest and she dozed off in his arms.

"Godric, you're getting heavy, Weasley. What are those Hufflepuffs feeding you?"

She mumbled something into his shoulder that made him laugh. Carson watched the exchange expressionlessly. Longbottom looked back at him. All the softness in eyes when he looked at Lucy disappeared to be replaced with a cold, hard glare when his eyes landed on him. He didn't say anything but instead carried Lucy to the door.

"Wait," Carson called. He tried not to seem too interested when he spoke. "You know where the Hufflepuff Basement is?"

Longbottom rolled his eyes again.

"No one knows where the Hufflepuff Basement is."

"Where's she going to sleep then?" Carson asked.

"With me," Longbottom answered, turning back to face the door. He muttered to himself, "Leila's going to kill me," and then shuffled out of the Great Hall.

Carson counted to ten before leaving. This was the second time he was threatened by an overprotective cousin— or sort of cousin— and he wanted to put as much space between himself and Lucy's best friend. There are risks that are not worth taking.

* * *

 **Okay, so yea, two Carson-centric chapters. I'm trying to get a feel for writing his personality. It's really hard btw. I hope you like this chapter. Please don't get bored. I swear there will be drama in the next chapter.**

 **Basically, Lissy**


	9. What Happened Last Night?

**I missed y'all! Sorry about that long wait. I hope this long chapter makes up for it.**

 **Okay, so it's gonna get a little serious and Lucy and Carson are going to sound a little- or very- out of character, but that is because they are changing from the toxic people they used to be to hopefully something much better. So bear with me.**

* * *

 _February 10, 2020_

"Where were you last night?" Bernard Ogden asked as he ran to catch up with Lucy on her way to History of Magic. She slowed her stride so that they fell in step.

"Gryffindor Tower," Lucy replied as they rounded the corner into a much busier hallway. He started walking slightly behind her so that he could more easily walk beside her in the crowded hall.

"You slept over on a Sunday?" he asked.

"Yeah," she answered quickly. Lucy dodged a sprinting first year and sidled up against the wall to avoid two Ravenclaws deep in conversation in the middle of the traffic. Bernie followed suit.

"So how are the girls?"

Lucy underwent a brief moment of confusion before realizing that he probably thought she had slept over with Roxanne and Lily. Instead of explaining the whole situation of the night before, which she didn't entirely remember herself, she just said, "They're good."

"So…"

Lily rolled her eyes, anticipating his question before he even asked it.

"Is Roxanne single?"

She looked over her shoulder at his big, hopeful, brown eyes and rolled her own. He asked her every day without fail and every day her answer was the same.

"Married to dance," Lucy laughed, shaking her head slightly at his small pout. "She occasionally as an affair with Quidditch."

Bernie groaned in frustration.

"She's never free!"

"On the contrary, she's free as a bird," Lucy quipped, "and she isn't landing anytime soon. Sorry, hun."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever."

"Oh, cheer up, old sport," Lucy encouraged in her awful British accent making Bernie cringe and then laugh- you'd think eleven years in England would be enough practice but no luck. "I hear that the cute Ravenclaw in our Potions class is planning on asking you to Hogsmeade."

"Where did you hear that?" he questioned, not at all looking like he believed her.

"Uh… me?"

"Lucy."

She defended her claim before he could accuse her of making things up to make him feel better again.

"Okay, so no one's actually told me that, but that's only because it's so obvious it doesn't even need to be said aloud. Everyone can see the way she looks at you during class and you told me yourself that she lent you a pencil in Arithmancy."

"So?" he shrugged. He reached his arm around her to push open the door to the class. They made their way to their seats together, all the way in the back of the classroom. They ended up sitting behind Carson and his girlfriend Cerise. The two were arguing about something in hushed voices.

Lucy leaned over and whispered to Bernie, "Trust me, she loves you."

Cerise turned around, snub nose high in the air.

"How could anyone love someone as repulsive as Bogden?"

A Slytherin nearby snickered at the awful pun.

Lucy leaned over her desk and retorted, "If _you_ can get a boyfriend, it must not be that difficult."

Cerise fumed.

"If it's so easy, why don't you have one? Huh, Weasley?"

Lucy narrowed her eyes.

"Maybe I don't need a boyfriend."

Cerise scanned her up and down disdainfully with her dark eyes.

"Maybe you do. It would do you some good to get laid."

Lucy gasped loudly and sat back into her seat, hand clutching her heart.

"Well, I never," she breathed out, Southern drawl lacing her words heavily.

"Obviously," Cerise muttered with a roll of her eyes. Lucy's jaw dropped.

"Reese," Carson interjected. "Enough."

Cerise turned around reluctantly. Carson gave Lucy a weird look like she was something new and strange. Lucy couldn't bare his gaze any longer, so she turned to face Bernard. His mouth was agape and his eyebrows were nearing his hairline with how high they were raised.

"What was that?" he whispered.

"What was what?"

Lucy wrapped her arms around herself and leaned back in her chair, feeling very attacked by the people around her. Somehow, Bernie's eyes grew even wider.

"You just stood up to Parkinson. What's gotten into you? First your fistfight with Avery," Lucy blushed remembering her impulsiveness, "then you stay out all night without telling anyone," Carson looked up at that and she saw him tilt his head towards them, interest peaked, "and now you're fighting Parkinson? You can't tell me that this isn't strange behavior, especially for a Lucy."

Lucy's arms tightened around her torso and her legs crossed over each other. She shrugged.

"I guess I've just reached my limit."

"I didn't even think you had a limit."

Lucy moved closer to Bernie and looked at him intently.

"Five years, Bernie. _Five years_ , not including this one, I have had to put up with all of it. I damn sure have a limit and this is it."

He looked like he was about to choke. Lucy groaned.

"Oh, get over it."

Bernie swallowed whatever he was going to say and turned to face the teacher, who had floated in during her little spat. Lucy wondered if she had been too harsh, but she shook the thought out of her head. Cerise got what she deserved.

Lucy turned to the textbook in front of her. Carson was still looking at her when she turned around. That strange look was still in his eyes and beneath his stare she felt like a new creature. She looked down at the textbook in the hopes that he would turn around and stop looking at her like he did…

… last night.

She couldn't remember last night. The last thing she remembered was falling asleep in the Astronomy Tower. When she woke up in Matt's bed, he explained that he had gone to get her from the Great Hall when Lily told him she was late to meet up with them and that she and Roxy were going to bed. So how did she get from the Astronomy Tower to the Great Hall?

He must have been alarmed when he saw the question in her eyes because he turned around quickly like he had been caught staring, even though they had been maintaining eye contact for a while. Why did he look so suspicious?

Carson leaned over his textbook, focused intently on reading, or at least he tried to make it look that way. Lucy continued to stare at his back for a few seconds after he already broken eye contact, wondering what it was that he was so poorly hiding. Maybe he had been caught in something.

* * *

Carson averted his eyes to the window when Lucy walked in. Mrs. Trundle hadn't shown up yet, so he was just sitting in her classroom the few minutes before detention actually started. He hoped that by blatantly ignoring her, Lucy would pick up the hint that he didn't want to talk. The Lucy he knew would, but the Lucy he saw today was a different person. She was suddenly unpredictable and it was extremely unnerving. He wouldn't be able to handle her questions. Last night had been very confusing for him. He had already been dealing with something that he could barely sort out in his mind, and then last night made him question his entire life.

It may not have seemed a big deal to anyone else, but he carried the daughter of a Muggle and a blood traitor, a Weasley nonetheless, on his back just so that he wouldn't disturb her and to be honest, he didn't really mind. He hadn't noticed initially, but over the course of their detentions, he was starting to refer to Lucy as something more than her blood. Did blood even matter? How could lineage affect humanity? Was a cause that got his father sent to jail and won for him the hatred of the entire Wizarding World a cause that was worth sticking to, now all these years after the war, for the sake of feeling some link to a father he couldn't even remember? And what if his doubts were right? What then? He couldn't just undo everything he had ever done in the name of his father. Maybe he should just stick to what he's been doing and pretend that this thought process never happened, seeing as redemption was so unreachable. But, no. There is no undo, not for his misdeeds and not for this moment.

His knee jerked up and hit the bottom of the desk sending a sharp pain through his leg as realized what just happened in his head. He let out a shaky breath. So, is that just it? He's not a blood purist anymore? Just like that? What now?

"Carson?"

 _Shit._ He did not need Lucy asking him questions about last night after he just disentangled them himself. Carson slowly turned around to face her, his mask of indifference positioned securely on his face to hide the life-changing revelation he had just experienced.

"What?"

"What happened last night?"

 _Shit._

"What are you talking about? The same thing that happens every night," he lied smoothly.

"No. I fell asleep in the Astronomy Tower. I can't remember the rest of the night."

Carson faced away from her.

"Matt picked you up."

Her hand grabbed his shoulder and forced him to face him.

"How did I get to the Great Hall, Avery?"

He subconsciously noted that she called him by his last name and he wasn't as okay with that as he used to be. He couldn't pinpoint why though.

"Why does it matter? Don't be so over-dramatic."

"Because, Avery, you can't look me in the eye. Looks like I'm not the only one making a big deal out of something that apparently doesn't matter."

She quirked an eyebrow, obviously believing she had him pinned and she kind of did.

"Nothing happened. Drop it," Carson commanded.

She leaned forward so that she was very close to him, well, as close as she could be with the desk between them.

"Listen, I've been going to school with you for six years. Pardon my French, but you have a suck-ass levitation spell. So, Avery, how did I get from the Astronomy Tower to the Great Hall?"

"Stop calling me that," he said through gritted teeth.

She pulled back and tilted her head.

"Your last name?"

He lifted his head to look her in the eye for the first time since History of Magic.

"Nothing. Happened."

He knew he made a mistake when her eyes widened.

"What did you do?"

"Lucy. Leave it alone. Nothing happened," Carson said, refusing to break eye contact even though he knew it was to his disadvantage.

She drew in very closely again so that his eyes almost had to cross to maintain eye contact. There was a new look in her eye that seemed out of place yet like a missing piece had been found. Every other Weasley had this fire in their eyes that Lucy had always lacked. He had seen her wear it once before, during their "muggle duel." He recalled that then, he had instigated the fight by telling her she was ugly when she was angry. How ironic. That definitely was not the case now. The look suited her. And it was kind of hot.

"How did I get from the Astronomy Tower to the Great Hall?"

She leaned in so that their noses were nearly touching.

" _Avery_."

He shot up and shouted, "Stop calling me that!"

Lucy stumbled back onto the desk behind her. Ms. Trundle walked in at that moment.

"What is going on here?"

Lucy and Carson both stared at each other, chests heaving and eyes angry. There was silence as they both refused to break eye contact, even as Lucy stood straight and fixed her skirt after falling onto the desk.

"Well?" Ms. Trundle insisted when neither of them said anything.

"Nothing," Lucy said, bunching her eyebrows together in confusion at Carson's outburst, no doubt. "Nothing happened."

"Well... then, take your seats."

Lucy went to sit in her seat across the rooms, eyes still on Carson who had already sat down. Meanwhile, Carson was mentally beating himself up for being so stupid. Now Lucy knew something happened because he insisted nothing happened. She was right, he was making a big deal out of something that he could just tell her and be over with. But it was a big deal to him.

* * *

After detention, Lucy followed Carson out into the hall. Instead of heading towards where she knew the Slytherin dorms were, he started to head up the stairs. Somehow, she knew where he was going.

"I'm going with you."

Carson turned around and arched his brow.

"No, you're not. Go to bed, Lucy."

He turned back around like the conversation was over and started heading to the tower. Lucy looked over her shoulder, contemplating heading back to the dorms but chased the thought out of her head. She hurried after Carson until she was walking beside him. He looked down at her and then forward again, seemingly indifferent. She walked beside him in silence.

When they reached the door to the tower, Lucy said, "Tell me what happened last night. It can't be that big of a deal."

He started up the steps without looking at her. She reached for his hand to pull him back. They both froze where they were. Carson looked down at their hands and Lucy watched his face, scared. She had forgotten what it felt like to be so scared of what someone else might think. Her body welcomed the familiarity of it and she was washed in the feeling. Her mind still fought for the confidence she was growing used to so her hand stayed clasped around his.

Carson's heartbeat sped up exponentially. He was terrified as well, but for a different reason.

"Carson."

His eyes snapped up to her face. He could tell that he had missed the sound of his name in her voice, as silly as that sounds, but he didn't want to. He didn't want any of it. He wanted to go back to who he was before all of this mess and fling his paper airplanes off the tower without any company. He wanted to go back to quiet misery and existential contemplation. He wanted to go back to writing his mother, asking if Father had written, and subtly questioning the pureblood ideals she clung to, to feel close to a man who left her with an infant son, an empty mansion, and a world of hatred tacked on to his last name. He wanted to go back to slowly changing and slowly staying the same. He wanted to go back to hating her, instead of needing her to get through whatever this was. _Bloody hell, I need a therapist._

Her imploring eyes pulled him back to the question.

"What happened last night?"

He muttered under his breath, "I carried you."

"What?"

Her grip slackened on his hand and he panicked. He slid his fingers in between her own like if she let go, it would all be over and he would go back to everything he wanted, pureblood supremacy and sitting alone in the Astronomy Tower night after night throwing paper planes into oblivion. Without her. He didn't want to tell her what it all meant because he was on the brink of untangling this whole mess and the last thing he needed was someone else to fall over the edge with him. But without her, there would be no mess to untangle. He couldn't keep her ignorant _and_ keep her.

Now it was her turn to stare at their intertwined hands, terrified, and his to watch her face, scared. He sighed dejectedly in defeat.

"I carried you. On my back. To the Great Hall."

There was silence as she looked contemplatively at his pale fingers in between her own tan ones and watched her face for any sign that she thought... well, he didn't know what he wanted her to think, but he wanted her to think something.

"Oh."

Her hand let go of his entirely so the only thing holding her there was his hand.

"Um, thanks."

Her voice was really small. He steeled himself with bravery very uncharacteristic of a Slytherin and barreled headfirst into an explanation.

"You were half-asleep and I tried to get you to walk but you asked me to carry you and I didn't want to get caught so I had to get you back to the Great Hall so I put you on my back and carried you through the hall and you were really heavy but not too heavy but you were breathing down my neck and you hugged me and that made it hard because... because reasons but I-"

"Okay."

Carson took a deep breath after his nervous ramble that was completely un-Carson-like.

"Okay?"

She nodded, eyes finally meeting his, no Weasley fire and no muddy introspection. Just tired resignation.

"Okay."

He looked around, confused at the sudden change in her. Did he say something wrong? _What are you thinking? Everything you said was wrong._

"So... do you want to go up now?"

"Um, actually," she disagreed, pulling her hand towards herself enough to pull him down the steps to stand in front of her, but not enough to get out of his grip, "I'm thinking about heading to bed."

He could feel himself start to panic and tried to recall his usual cool and collected demeanor before he did something else he would regret.

"Are-" he licked his dried lips, "are you sure?"

She looked like she was actually thinking about it.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure."

"O-okay. Er, I'll see you tomorrow?"

He cursed himself for making it sound more like a question than a statement, but it was a question at this point. She ran her thumb over his knuckles in a way that felt way too much like goodbye. She nodded her head in assurance.

"I'll see you in detention."

He nodded too, pulling his mask over his face like pretending not to care would actually make a difference after that blatant display of emotions.

"See you in detention."

She turned to leave but was anchored back in place by his hand still holding tightly to hers. She looked at his hand then his face expectantly.

"Um, Carson? You can let go now."

"Right, right."

He blushed through his mask as he let her hand go. She turned to leave, but his hand shot out in desperation and grabbed her by the fingers. She turned and looked at his hand again, before looking up at him. He didn't notice because he was very busy wallowing in self-hatred, eyes shut tightly in an embarrassed wince. He let her go quickly like it burned. When he opened his eyes, she was looking at him with a small, pitiful pout.

 _I don't want your pity,_ his mind said in disdain.

 _Yes, you do,_ countered the part of his mind that hates him, the same part that kept grabbing Lucy's hand. _You'll take anything she offers, as long as she stays._

Carson scowls and Lucy's eyes widen at the animosity in his expression.

"No, no! Not you," Carson corrected, wanting to smack himself in the face at this point. "I just thought something that I didn't want to think."

 _Why am I still talking?_

 _Because she makes you crazy._

 _No,_ you _make me crazy._

She looked at him like he was crazy.

"I just have to explain things to you. To me."

His eyes couldn't find something to land on so they danced around the hall as he tried to collect his thoughts.

"Listen."

His eyes snapped to her at the sound of her voice.

"I can tell you wanna talk about some things or something and you want someone to talk to, but I'm really tired and _really_ confused. I promise you can say whatever you wanna say tomorrow. Okay?"

He nodded too quickly for his pride to handle. She gave him a small smile and turned to leave, presumably to the Hufflepuff dorms.

"Get some sleep," she called over her shoulder from the end of the hall and in the dead silence of the hall, he could hear it as clearly as if she had been standing next to him.

That night, he didn't sleep at all.

* * *

 **So, it has been a while since I last wrote. I was having trouble fleshing out this new side of Carson. I hope you stay with me through this chapter and the next one, which will be up around Christmas, I promise.**

 **If you have any suggestions, I'm always happy to hear them, no matter how silly. I like to think that I am very nonjudgemental and if you really want, you can suggest anonymously.**

 **Basically, Lissy**

 **(P.S. I missed you guys.)**


	10. Let's Try Friends

**Okay, so let's find out what Carson wants to say.**

* * *

 _February 11, 2020_

Mackenzie Hayward's obnoxious voice filled the Great Hall from where she sat at the Hufflepuff table. Most of the Hufflepuffs were done or almost done with their food and just sitting in amicable company, seeing as most Hufflepuffs were very early risers. The curvy redhead was loudly recounting an anecdote from her wild summer in her thick Scottish accent. As the end of her story was met with uproarious laughter from the sixth year Hufflepuffs, Bernard Ogden noticed that Lucy was just pushing her food around her plate and asked, "What's the matter?"

Before she could answer, Colin Wrunn chimed, "What's wrong with our sunshine?"

Lucy gave a reluctant smile, but when she looked up, she made eye contact with Carson from across the hall and her smile faded. He was watching her. His cool facade was back in place and she had almost forgotten how unnerving his poker face could be. She looked down and peeked up. He was still looking at her.

She cleared her throat.

"Nothing, I just, um, you know, detention."

"Is it Avery again?" Wendy Laudlin asked sympathetically as she reached across the table to place her hand over Lucy's hand.

Lucy supposed that that was why she liked Wendy so much. She reminded her of home and the antiquated Southern belles it was famous for. Although there was no such thing as a Southern belle any longer, the ideals of a Southern belle were things most Southern women carried with them. Gentle kisses on the cheek for friends and strangers, ladylike values, demure looks, porcelain masks, good food, and sweet smiles. Wendy carefully painted her face with makeup every day, never forgetting to carefully twist her brown hair into a bun or braid every day. She may be British, but Wendy was a strong reminder of home. Mackenzie was also a reminder of home but a different side of home. More specifically, the side of home that killed off the Southern belles. The redhead represented the loud, crass, drunken, party-going part of home. She was grateful for a reminder of home so far away.

"No. I'm just tired is all. Don't worry about it."

When Carson's eyes on her grew to be too much to handle, she stood up.

"I have to talk to a teacher about a quiz so I'm gonna head to class early. I'll see y'all in History of Magic."

She could tell they didn't believe her- she had never been a great liar- but she left anyway without any further excuses.

Carson's eyes followed her the whole way.

* * *

"Hey, Avery. Mate. Carson."

Carson looked away from Lucy as she vanished through the Great Hall doors.

"What do you want, Gianni?" Carson snapped.

Gianni quirked an eyebrow. He looked between Carson and the door Lucy had just disappeared through, no doubt catching the looks Carson had been giving her all morning.

"Is this about that fight you two had on Saturday? What was that about?"

"Nothing."

Carson was dying to talk to someone about it, about everything, but he was holding out until detention. Lucy played a part in this- how, he wasn't sure- but one thing was certain: she was starting to mean a great deal more than what she was supposed to.

"Okay, whatever."

Carson heard Cerise whisper a question to Gianni regarding his attitude to which Gianni responded with a shrug. Marcus nervously avoided eye contact and the three Slytherins carried on breakfast without him.

* * *

That evening when Carson showed up for detention, Lucy was already there, as was Miss Trundle, who was diligently grading papers. Lucy avoided eye contact with him and Carson noted the irony of them switching places. Yesterday, he was the one avoiding eye contact when she walked in.

"Ah, yes, Mr. Avery," Miss Trundle acknowledged, looking up from her stack of tests. "Ms. Weasley will fill you in on your assignment for today's detention."

Carson looked to Lucy, who was picking at something on the desk. When she noticed his expectant eyes, she got up and, eyes averted, told him that they would be restocking the Potions closet. Before he could say anything, she turned and left the classroom. He followed.

His confusion only lasted a moment when she passed the Potions closet and continued on. He realized where they were going. When they finally reached the door, she didn't hesitate, but flung it open and started up the staircase. He hurried after her.

When he reached the top, she was sitting where he normally sat, legs dangling over the edge and elbows propped up on the lowest bar. He walked over and sat beside her, nerves forming a knot in his stomach.

"So, you wanted to say something?" she asked, getting right to the chase.

He cleared his throat. This is all he had been thinking of since last night. His hands were shaking in anticipation and he ran them through his hair to give them something to do. He had prepared something to say, but at the moment it all left him. He searched for the words he didn't remember before finally deciding to wing it.

"I wanted to say a lot of things. I don't know what to say now."

She nodded, eyes trained on the horizon.

"First, the paper airplanes."

"Right, the airplanes, okay," he said with a deep breath. "So, I've been writing my mother a lot recently. Mostly about trivial things like schoolwork and how she's doing. Sometimes I'll ask about my father, but that's usually fruitless."

She looked at him, but he looked away.

"Anyway, I've been writing my mother. She's always been awfully worried about me going to school with a bunch of, well, a bunch of muggleborns and the like."

Even from his peripheral vision, he could see the surprise on Lucy's face at the sudden turn the conversation took.

"And, I don't know, I didn't completely agree with her."

Lucy quirked an eyebrow at that. Not that he could blame her.

"Let me go back. Okay, my dad's in jail. He was a death eater, he did bad things. I never knew the man."

There was that pity again. Merlin, he hated pity.

"I don't really care, but Mum does. She promised him when he left that she'd raise me right by him. Well, right by him isn't very right at all and you can see how that turned out. I think she still believes in the cause to feel closer to my dad in some way."

There was a pause of silence before he muttered, "I know that's why _I_ did it, at least."

"Hold on. Are you telling me- never mind. I have no idea what you're telling me... Are you saying you've been faking this whole time just to feel close to your dad?"

He couldn't look her in the eyes.

"Not faking, really. It's more like I forced myself to buy into it."

She placed her fingers through her temples and rubbed them in circles, no doubt to soothe the headache she must have gotten from trying to wrap her head around his confession. Even though he knew that whatever happened next would mean redemption or condemnation by her, he felt like a weight had been lifted off of his chest. He let out a deep breath and laughed.

She definitely was looking at him like he was crazy by now.

"Why on Earth are you laughing?" she asked, face screwed up in that way it did whenever she was confused.

He smiled at her genuinely and he could see her visibly stop breathing. His subconscious, you know, the one that hates him, triumphed in the fact that she wasn't the only one who could steal breath away with a smile.

"You have no idea how long I've wanted to say that. I brought it up to Cerise- hypothetically, of course- and she laughed at me like I was insane."

"You do sound a little insane," Lucy noted, but her smile was enough to let him know that she was okay. "So the airplanes?"

"Therapy."

"How?" she asked, head tilted to the side.

He felt excited like he could ride a broom standing up, or on his head! He was absolutely giddy with relief.

"I read in a book that to alleviate stress and avoid getting caught up in a pity party you can write down what you're thankful for. So I write the things I'm thankful for on papers and I send them off into the night sky."

"It sounds awfully romantic," she sighed wistfully, looking out at the landscape.

He let out a carefree laugh.

"You would say that."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Lucy inquired in mock anger. He rolled his eyes.

"You Hufflepuffs are hopeless romantics."

She huffed and crossed her arms.

"You think you know me so well."

He looked down at his hands, shifting into a more serious disposition.

"No."

Instead of asking anything, she just let him read the question off of her face.

"I don't think I know you well at all. And that's the confusing part. We've had detention together for what? A week? Maybe less? One hour a day sitting in silence in a classroom or sitting in silence in the Astronomy Tower. Then one night I carry you on my back and I'm a different person? All of my beliefs, all of my carefully built personality, is thrown out of the window and out into oblivion with my paper airplanes. I can't wrap my head around it. What is it about you that changes me?"

Lucy thought for a while as he looked to her for the answer. After a few seconds ticked by, she said, "It isn't me that's changing you. You're changing you."

"Not until you happened," he argued. She shrugged.

"Maybe I was just motivation."

At the thought, they both turned bright red. The silence was thicker now, filled with things they didn't even know they wanted to say. Carson watched her hands play with the hem of her skirt and Lucy watched the hair on her shoulder flutter in the breeze.

"Carson," she finally said, "you've been an awful person in the past. It doesn't matter whether you believed it or not. You have said some awful things about me and about others. You can't expect to turn over a new leaf just like that."

"What do I do then?" he asked. "Keep doing what I've always done? You just said it. I was awful."

"Carson, why doesn't blood define a wizard?"

"Well, because... because..." He scratched his head for the answer. "I don't know but I know it doesn't."

"See? That's your answer."

She grabbed his hand and he cursed himself again when his heartbeat sped up.

 _Something serious is going on, Subconscious,_ his mind told his mind. _Please focus_.

"You still don't know why you believe what you believe."

"Why can't you just tell me?" he asked frustratedly.

"You know that's not how it works."

"How does it work then?" he asked, more forcefully than he had meant to. Her eyes narrowed.

"Maybe you should do some thinking instead of asking me for all the answers to your problems."

"Well, that's hardly fair," he rebutted, crossing his arms. "All I do lately is think and mostly about you. You're the biggest problem."

Her hands were on her hips and the fire was in her eyes again.

 _That's so hot_ , said his subconscious, who had obviously not heeded his previous request.

"Excuse me?"

"That's not what I meant," he tried to amend.

She stood up and he followed suit.

"Then what _did_ you mean?" she asked accusatorily. He ran a frustrated hand through his wavy hair.

"I don't know. It's just that you started all of this."

She poked a finger at his chest.

"You said yourself that you were writing your mom about it long before any of this happened."

He sighed.

"Look, I didn't mean to accuse you of anything. I just meant that for some reason you're a part of this. Therefore, I end up thinking about you a lot."

Her cheeks colored slightly. She reverted back to old Lucy for a split second, all demure eyelashes and folded hands.

"You do?" she asked shyly.

He groaned. Now was no the time for her reappearance.

"Of course I do, woman. You're making me question my entire existence! Did you not listen to any part of the past conversation? I literally spend most of my waking hours contemplating you and some of my sleeping hours too!"

"No need to get all huffy. I never asked for any of this."

"Sorry, but it's true."

"I know."

"Uggggghhhhhhh."

He dropped his head onto the railing with a thud.

"Lucy, what do I do?"

She placed a consoling hand on his back and offered, "Maybe, if I'm really the instigator of this whole mess, trying to be friends will instigate the mess out of existence."

He turned his head to look up at her with one eye. The moon made her hair glow like light cascading down her shoulders. She grinned and her smile was effervescent. He also didn't mind the way that she was biting her lip. At that moment, he could have stared at her forever.

"You have the weirdest way of thinking, you know that?"

" _I_ have the weirdest way of thinking? _I'm_ not the one who spends their every waking hour 'contemplating' me."

"Shut up," he joked with a slight smile. "I said _most_ of my waking hours."

"And some of your sleeping hours too," she chirped.

This friendship thing was kind of working. He grew excited at the prospect of change, real change, and what this could all mean.

"Let's head down," he finally suggested, standing upright.

"Carry me," she joked as they headed towards the stairs. He laughed.

"No way is that ever happening again."

She rolled her eyes.

"Was I really that heavy?"

Memories of last night that he had tried so hard to flush out flooded his mind. Unbidden images of her legs wrapped around his hips, squeezing him tighter to her body, came to his mind and made his knees weak, and the memory of her lips accidentally brushing his neck when her head lolled onto his shoulder caused him to shiver so noticeably she must have seen it. He hoped that she attributed it to the cold.

"Yes. You were very heavy."

She playfully hit his shoulder as she started down the stairs. He watched her figure disappear around the corner and thought to himself, _What_ _the_ _hell_ _am_ _I_ _doing?_

* * *

 **Aw, look. Carson's being human. Lol thanks for reading with me this far. I hope you are all okay with the story's sudden change. I'm hoping to delineate Carson's path to redemption throughout the story and Lucy's role in it.**

 **If you want to see some more of my next gen world, check out my Tumblr blog, mine-ng-headcanons.**

 **Basically, Lissy**


	11. Carson Sucks as a Friend

**Tell me in your review your personal headcanons about Lucy Weasley! I'd love to hear them!**

* * *

 _February 12, 2020_

Lucy walked out of the Greenroom laughing. The classes before lunch were always her favorite. History of Magic was dull, but afterward was Care of Magical Creatures and Art, her two electives, and then she had Herbology with all of the sixth year Hufflepuffs, the class she was just now leaving. After Herbology, she had a free period and then lunch. She shared her free period with Hugo, Matt, and Roxanne, as well as some of the Slytherins, which was normally a downside but not enough to ruin her day.

"Lucy!"

Lucy looked over her shoulder at the familiar voice. Striding down the hall was Roxanne with Hugo and Matt in tow.

Her Hufflepuff friends bid her goodbye as they headed to their next classes or wherever they spend their free periods. Roxanne's long legs reached her first and she found herself enveloped by long, muscular arms. Her face was pressed against a built torso and she could only see wild reddish-brown hair wherever she turned.

"Okay, Roxy, you're strangling the poor girl," Hugo said, laughing. Roxanne took a step back and let Lucy breathe.

"I'm so sorry I missed our last Saturday meeting. I hope you and Lily still got to spend time together."

"Yeah, we sat and talked by the lake."

Roxanne pouted apologetically.

"Sorry. If I had only been there, we could have gone to do something fun, like going adventuring or something."

"No, really," Lucy insisted, "it's fine."

Her tall cousin huffed.

"If Gregory weren't being so temperamental, maybe I could have gone, but no, we need the extra two hours of practice. Honestly."

She rolled her eyes. Hugo, Matt, and Lucy shared a look at the obliviousness of their friend. How she hadn't yet picked up on Greg's undeniable feelings for her was beyond them. She had never been very good with those sort of things, though. Hugo started walking them towards courtyard where they usually spent their free periods together.

"So, Lucy," he started, "how has detention been going?"

"Uh," she recalled her conversation with Carson and her new enterprise of friendship with him. She wondered if it were really possible to be friends with someone who had bullied her relentlessly for her entire academic career. What if he deemed it too hard of an endeavor and quit halfway through? What if he decided she wasn't the person he needed to change? What if he changes and realizes she had fulfilled her purpose and was no longer necessary? "Uneventful."

"Really?" Hugo looked surprised. "I expected there to be more-"

"Drama?" Lucy provided. "Don't be silly. We just sit with Miss Trundle for an hour. Nothing happens."

She gasped slightly when she realized she was telling them exactly what Carson had been telling her instead of the truth of what happened Sunday night. She felt bad for lying to her friends, but she knew they wouldn't support her decision to be friends with him. They were all too protective of her to let her get so close to someone like him. She remembered at the beginning of the month in Hogsmeade when Louis warned her to stay away from Carson. They definitely could not know.

"If you say so," Hugo shrugged. He didn't look like he believed her, but he dropped it for the time being. Matt, on the other hand, would not be so quick to excuse it. He had a knack for just sensing things. She could tell by the look in his eyes that the next time they were alone together she would be interrogated very thoroughly.

The four of them took a seat on a bench under the covered walkway surrounding the courtyard. It was very cold and snowy, but they liked cold and snowy so it was okay. She enjoyed the few minutes she had with them, even though Hugo decided to go to the library a few minutes in and Roxanne was pulled to the field by one of Greg's Quidditch cronies. Now came the moment she had been dreading, much sooner than she had expected.

"So... detention is going fine then?"

She groaned and dropped her head onto his broad chest.

"Please just leave it alone, Matt."

"There is an it to be left alone? I thought nothing happens."

Lucy tilted her head up so that her chin was on his sternum and she was looking up at the underside of his face. He craned his neck to look her in her wide, puppy dog eyes. She whined out, "Matty."

"Lucy," he mocked in the same singsong tone.

She sat back with a huff. Her puppy dog eyes always worked on him. Always. She hated that he was so stubborn.

"Matt, why are you looking for problems where there are no problems?" she chastised.

"Maybe if you told me the truth, I wouldn't be so suspicious," he countered.

She threw her arms up in exasperation.

"I _did_ tell you the truth!"

"No you didn't," he insisted. "I know you, Lucy. I know you, and I know how to tell when you're lying. You play with the back of your earring when you're nervous and you rub the back of your hands when you're guilty. You did both."

She was stunned for a moment at the reminder of just how well her best friend knew her. Despite how pushy and overbearing and overprotective Matt was, he was her very best friend in this world, and everything he did that she found annoying, he did in her best interest. "I love you, Matt." His eyes softened slightly. "So please let it go."

His eyes hardened again and he set his lip with determination. _Oh, no._

"Lucy, I know something's up. I can see it in your eyes whenever your detention comes up in conversation and I can see it in his eyes at the slightest mention of your name. Now, I don't know what's going and I won't jump to conclusions, but if something happens in detention and I don't know about whatever's going on, I wouldn't be able to do anything."

"Matt, you are going above and beyond with this. You are entirely too overprotective. We're in high school. What do you honestly think is the worst that could happen?"

He opened his mouth, but she cut him off before he could say anything.

"Never mind. Don't answer that. The point is, you are absolutely ridiculous when it comes to this stuff, so can you just this once trust me when I say that everything is fine?"

He was silent for a second, his dark eyes scanning her expectant face. She waited with bated breath for his answer. It's not that Matt was her keeper- he wasn't, that's crazy- it's just that knowing he would leave the matter alone and allow her to figure it out on her own would bring her some much-needed peace.

"Fine." A Cheshire grin started spreading across her face. "But! If I hear anything, _anything_ , literally any petty he said she said, I will not hesitate to hex that bloke like no tomorrow."

She laughed.

"Thank you, Matty. And there won't be any need for that. But thanks anyway."

He nodded.

"Leila wants me to walk her to lunch so I have to go, but I'll see you after detention?"

"Yeah, after detention," she agreed, standing up with him. "Tell Leila I said hi."

He gave her a look that told her he totally was not going to do that.

"Yeah, of course."

They hugged and then she was alone on the bench. She thought that she might head back to the common room when she heard laughter down the hall. She looked in the direction of the snickering voices and couldn't help her heart rate when she saw Carson turn the corner. How do they act now? Like friends? Acquaintances? Do they pretend they don't even know each other?

Her nervous energy died when she saw that he wasn't alone. Close behind him was his lackey Gianni Zabini and a snickering Cerise Parkinson.

She turned quickly, hoping they wouldn't notice her sitting alone on the bench, but they saw her anyway as they got closer.

"Hey, Weasley," Cerise greeted with a mocking voice as she stopped in front of the bench. Lucy turned to face her. Cerise was standing very closely, looming over her so that she had to crane her neck up and up and up to meet those jeering eyes. Behind her, Gianni was grinning wickedly. In the back of the small trio of Slytherins stood Carson, looking at her with wide eyes like he expected her to make the first move. She looked back at him, urging him with her eyes to do something.

"Where are your Gryffindors, Fluffypuff?" Cerise snarked. Lucy's eyes flicked up to her face before quickly looking to the ground. "Oh, did your little burst of courage from earlier leave you? Was it just a phase?"

Lucy wanted to be defiant, she really did, but Cerise was standing over her, looking down at her like she's a nothing. She couldn't find the strength in her to meet her eyes, so instead, she looked at Carson. He looked like he had words on the tip of his tongue and something to say was stuck in his throat.

When he just stood there doing nothing, she muttered under her breath, "Fine."

She grabbed her bag and stood up from the bench, fixing Carson with a glare that made him shrink into his robes. Avoiding eye contact with her, Lucy surrendered to Cerise, "I'll go. You win."

As she walked past Carson, she purposefully ignored him trying to get her attention. Her shoulder knocked his as she stormed out of the hallway. He obviously had no idea what being a friend actually means.

* * *

That night in detention, Miss Trundle stayed the whole night in the room. She gave them a paper to write about the importance of being kind to all. Lucy furiously scratched down an entire rant, lowkey throwing shade at Carson without mentioning him or the occurrence of that day specifically. Once again, Carson wasn't writing anything, instead using his time to relentlessly try to get her attention without alerting Miss Trundle.

She sat steadfastly through every whispered "Psst. Hey. Lucy." She managed to ignore every tap of his pencil on her desk. Running off of her anger only, she put her all into the essay. That is until he flicked a ball of paper at her head.

Remember that unit of measurement she had invented, the Avery? Yes, well, about 3 billion Averys were pounding in her veins, making it impossible to focus on anything other than the infuriating asshole sitting next to her.

"Psst. Hey. Lucy."

She turned sideways in her seat to face him, arms crossed and eyebrows raised expectantly. He shrunk in his seat from across the aisle between their desks. It reminded her so much of his reaction earlier during free period when she had asked for help that the Averys doubled.

"Er..." He twiddled his thumbs in his lap semi-avoiding her eyes. "Are you mad at me?"

The intensity of her glare doubled and her eyebrows furrowed low together over her eyes.

"Am I _mad_ at you?" she repeated incredulously. His nervous glance towards the front of the room reminded her to keep her voice down, as difficult as it may be. She answered in a lower voice, "Of course, I'm mad at you. No, not just mad, furious!"

He quickly shushed her, only infuriating her more, but she quieted again.

"Do you even know what the word 'friend' even means? Friends help each other. Friends defend their friends when they get bullied. _Friends act like friends_."

He looked down at his feet, ashamed. She softened for a minute, battling with her instincts to not make people feel bad, but she quickly reminded herself that he deserved to feel bad the way he had made her feel earlier.

"Lucy, I'm sorry. I didn't know what I could do," he apologized, looking truly apologetic.

"You could have told her to stop."

"What Cerise does is not my fault. She's her own person."

She leaned forward in her seat, wanting him to listen very carefully to what she had to say.

"I am not mad at you for what Cerise did. I mad at you for what you _didn't_ do. You didn't act like my friend."

"What was I supposed to do?"

"Stand up for me!" she exclaimed, slamming her palms down on her desk.

"Ms. Weasley!" Miss Trundle admonished. "This hostile behavior is the exact reason you are in detention now. Turn around and finish your work."

With a final look of disdain in his direction, she turned back to her paper and finished her concluding paragraph. When she was done, she put her head down to wait for the bell and pretended to sleep. She couldn't actually sleep, not with his eyes boring into the side of her head like that.

He spent the rest of the night in the Astronomy Tower, throwing paper planes until dawn.

* * *

 **Oooo...**

 **So friendship isn't working. Let's hope Carson can fix this. Please review, even if it's just a smiley face.**

 **Basically, Lissy**


	12. Lucy Forgives Him Anyway

**Chapter 12: Lucy Forgives Him Anyway**

* * *

 _February 13, 14, and 15, 2020_

Two days. Two whole days. Lucy refused to speak to him for two. Entire. Freaking. Days.

Thursday was hell. She was already in the Great Hall when he went in for breakfast, and she sat on the side of the Gryffindor table that faced away from the Slytherin table. In first period History of Magic, she traded places with Trudy Stamm, claiming to have forgotten her glasses that day and couldn't see the board from all the way in the back where she normally sat behind him. As she was leaving, however, he could see her giant glasses poking out of her robe pocket. He spent all of his free period looking for her, but he couldn't find her anywhere. When he got to lunch, she was sitting with the Hufflepuffs on the side facing the Slytherins, so he sat on the side that faced her but she blatantly ignored him the entire time. In Transfiguration, she sat quietly in the back. He had to completely turn around in his seat in the front of the class to see her. Her eyes met him only once before looking away when the teacher told him to face forward. Finally, in detention, Miss Trundle left to turn something in, and when he got up to head to the Astronomy Tower, she continued sorting the bookshelf. He went up alone and angrily hurled paper planes into the sky, all of which had angry words written into them, almost all about her. He came back to her sitting in her seat quietly, legs crossed at the knee and hands folded on her lap. She was just staring ahead and didn't acknowledge his return at all. Shortly after Miss Trundle came in and dismissed them. She flew out of the classroom like a bat out of hell. She was already long gone by the time he stepped out into the hallway. All in all, Thursday was awful.

Friday, however, sucked. Big time. First of all, she spent breakfast surrounded by the Gryffindors, still facing away from him. Secondly, she stayed in Trudy's spot for History of Magic, despite the fact that she was wearing her glasses. Thirdly, all of her free period was spent with the male Longbottom, and at lunch, she snuck away with Rose, Roxanne, and Lily, laughing. Fourthly, she ignored him completely during Transfiguration, even when he went over to her desk before class. She just acted like she couldn't even hear him and the teacher came in before he could really even say anything. Lastly, and worstly, Colin Wrunn was in detention.

He fully intended to say and do anything and everything that would end this horrid cold shoulder she was giving him. He had spent the past two days planning exactly how it would go, down to smallest detail. Colin Wrunn was not in the plan.

When he walked into detention, Miss Trundle wasn't there yet. Lucy was sitting in her usual seat, and Wrunn was sitting on her desk, legs spread so she was practically in between them. She was leaning back in her chair, arm slung over the back of it casually. He was leaning forward, forearms braced on his thighs and face annoyingly close to hers. They were laughing, and he kept reaching forward to push her glasses up the bridge of her nose.

Carson cleared his throat when they failed to notice him after a minute. Both Hufflepuffs looked towards him standing in the doorway. It was the first time she had purposefully looked in his direction since their argument on Wednesday. He just stared at her for a while before he realized that she probably expected him to say something.

"So..." he started awkwardly, "what's going on here?"

Lucy glared and turned back to Wrunn. Wrunn rolled his eyes and said, "Sod off, mate."

He went to turn back to Lucy but stopped mid-turn when Carson replied, "I'm not your mate."

Wrunn arched an eyebrow at Lucy as if to say _Is this guy serious?_ before leveling Carson with a cold look. Colin Wrunn had frigidly cold, pale blue eyes that froze the air around him.

Underneath his icy gaze, Carson managed to stutter out, "It's just that, you can't just- just come in here and be all- all... why are you here?"

Wrunn smiled sharply with his fluorescent white smile before side-eyeing Lucy and saying, "I just came to spend time with my favorite Weasley, that's all."

Carson could see Lucy fighting a smile when she disagreed, "Shut up. You talked back in class and got detention."

They were fully immersed in each other again. He leaned forward even more and grinned slyly.

"Maybe I did it on purpose."

She laughed it off, but Carson could see her blush from where he stood.

"You're so full of it."

Wrunn shrugged.

"Maybe I am full of it. Or maybe I just wanted to get you alone."

Their noses were practically touching now, so Carson felt the need to say something.

"Yeah, not alone. I'm still here."

Wrunn sighed when Carson broke the moment, turning to the Slytherin with a very frustrated look on his face. He stood up from the desk at his full height. And wow, was he tall.

Carson wasn't really a short guy per say, but he definitely wasn't the tallest either. Most guys he knew were taller than him and most girls were around his height or shorter than him, but not by much. Wrunn, on the other hand, was easily a head or two taller than him. He had to crane his neck up and up to look him in his frosty eyes. He was skinny- skinnier than Carson and skinnier than Lucy- and wiry with this weird muscle to him that was just enough to look threatening. What Carson didn't have in height, he made up for in shape. He considered himself pretty well-built for a non-athletic guy, but somehow, that didn't seem to matter to Wrunn, who glared down at him like he was a nuisance.

"Is there a problem, Avery?"

Carson didn't know Wrunn very well at all, but before today, he would not have thought there was a single Hufflepuff willing to take on a Slytherin. After being subject to the look in Wrunn's eyes, he might have to change that belief.

"No. No. No problem," Carson said hastily, making his way to his usual seat. Lucy avoided looking at him again, looking instead at the ground.

Wrunn followed him with his eyes all the way to his chair and continued to glare even after Carson had taken a seat. After a few seconds of awkward silence, Lucy spoke up.

"Colin, leave him be."

The wiry blond turned back to Lucy with that same sharp smile.

"Of course, love."

Lucy scoffed at his charm, but Carson could see her ears turn red in his peripheral vision. She didn't turn red like that with him. With him, it was always an angry red. He tried not to snap his quill in his fist.

As Colin retook his seat on the edge of Lucy's desk, legs parted around her, she retorted, "Don't call me that. Trudy wouldn't like it."

Colin rolled his eyes.

"So? I don't care."

Lucy smirked, yet another expression that looked wrong on her face.

"We both know that's not true."

"Damn you, Weasley," Colin grumbled. "I'm trying to get you into my bed and you bring feelings into it."

 _How much detention would I get for murder?_

"So you admit that you have feelings for Trudy?"

 _She gets so adorably excited._

"No, no, that's not what I said. You're trying to bring Trudy into this when I'm trying to sleep with you."

 _Would he really be missed?_

"No, you said I'm trying to bring feelings into it. Don't reword."

 _She can be clever, too._

"Same thing. The point is, I want you. Tonight, preferably."

 _Wow, I really hate this guy._

"Are you saying feelings and Trudy are the same? Sounds like you like her to me."

 _Well, I can kind of relate to him..._

"If I liked Trudy, why would I be here seducing you?"

 _Then again, I also really hate him._

"Trying to seduce me," Lucy corrected. "And it's because you're a relentless flirt."

Wrunn shrugged and smiled.

"Guilty as charged."

Carson listened to their banter for the first thirty minutes of detention before Miss Trundle got there. Back and forth, back and forth. He would try to convince her into his bed, and she would try to convince him of his love for Trudy Stamm. Carson had no idea he could hate someone so much, and he also had no idea he could lo- like someone so much. Now, however, he was fully aware of how much he hated Colin Wrunn and how much he lo- _liked_ Lucy Weasley. When Miss Trundle finally came, she ordered Wrunn to get in his seat- which was directly behind Lucy's by the way- and told them all to organize some study cards alphabetically. Carson breathed a sigh of relief that the torture was over, but he was too quick to count his cards. The rest of detention was spent sorting potion cards and listening to Wrunn whisper things he would rather not have heard him whisper into Lucy's ear.

When it was finally, _finally_ over, Carson almost cried from relief. He gathered his things as quickly as he could and deposited the organized cards on the teacher's desk. He tried to get out as soon as possible, but as he hightailed it to the Astronomy Tower, he could hear them chatting amicably about this or that on their way back to their respective beds, he hoped.

Every paper plane he made was blank.

* * *

"So you just sat here?" Roxanne asked, looking particularly underwhelmed. Lily nodded.

"Yep. We just sat here. It's actually pretty nice to just talk instead of going off in the woods or whatever."

"Not that we don't enjoy going off into the woods during our Saturday meetings," Lucy quickly added. "It's just that sometimes we like to take a break."

The three girls met that afternoon for another one of their Saturday meetings. This time Roxanne could attend, so Lily suggested they show Roxanne that they could enjoy time together while _not_ risking their lives in the Forbidden Forest. Roxanne wasn't getting it.

"So... Lucy," Lily said, turning to her blonde cousin, "how has detention been?"

Lucy immediately launched into an angry rant about Colin Wrunn, leaving no detail out. They spent the whole afternoon chatting like that, complaining and lamenting and entertaining. They didn't take any heed to the people around them, and no one bothered the three cousins lying recumbent by the lake. That is until Carson Avery worked up the nerve to approach Lucy out in the open while surrounded by her cousins.

"Er... Lucy?"

Lucy squinted up at the shadow that fell over her. Though it was still very chilly, it was an oddly sunny day. She noticed his fidgeting hands first before meeting his dark eyes. She wasn't very good at reading people, but his darting eyes and twitching fingers gave away his nervous energy.

"What do you want, Avery?" Roxanne asked forcefully.

Carson visibly shrunk in on himself, but he mustered the courage to ignore the tallest Quidditch player on the Gryffindor team and instead looked Lucy directly in the eyes and asked, "Can we talk?"

She glared at him. He pulled his eyebrows into a pleading expression, and she lifted her chin indifferently. Lily caught the exchange.

"Yeah, sure," the ginger answered for her quiet cousin. "We'll be here if you need us."

Roxanne's eyes darted between Lily and Lucy and Carson nervously. She stared at Lily like the witch had gone insane. Lucy's eyes widened in alarm before whipping around to gape at her cousin in disbelief.

"Lily, no, I-"

Lily shushed her friend and nudged her to her feet. Smiling up at her innocently, Lily urged Lucy, "Go on. Roxanne and I will be here when you get back."

" _If_ I get back," Lucy muttered under her breath. Carson heard and winced.

She led the two of them all the way up to the Astronomy Tower in silence before crossing her arms and turning to the object of her anger. Her fury faltered at the apologetic look on his face, but she steeled herself again and fixed him with a hard glare.

Carson didn't like these glares that she kept sending his way. It was different than her usual, explosive outbursts of anger. Her eyes should be lighting up like fireworks and her face should be turning a bright Weasley red. Her lips should be set in a snarl, an expression he'd only ever seen on her, and her hands should be fluttering around her as she shouted at him in a loud volume she rarely reached. This... this was different. Now she only looked at him with a hurt, indignant glare that hit him hard like a battering ram. It was like a wall, and it was so frustrating.

"So?" Lucy asked impatiently from where she stood by the railing. He stood anxiously by the door with one hand sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck.

"Lucy, listen-"

Well, you can't say she didn't try. She really did.

"No, _you_ listen!" she shouted whipping around to face him. "What the hell is wrong with you?!"

Call him crazy, but her shouting and turning red calmed him down because at least it was something familiar. He could feel the corner of his mouth start to involuntarily quirk up in a smile, which only served to incense her more.

"Don't just smile like you have everything under control because you don't! You don't, you don't, you don't!"

She knew how ridiculous she looked. She was practically throwing a tantrum, but, _goddammit_ , she was mad.

Carson fought to subdue his fond smile. He definitely had a death wish.

"Stop smiling at me! Take this seriously," Lucy said, striding towards him. He may have had a death wish, but he had enough common sense to step back a few steps. His smile, on the other hand, was barely restrained. She was normal Lucy again, fire in her eyes and all, and she was talking to him again. How could he not smile? She stopped a few feet away from him, arms flying expressively as he spoke.

"Stop it! You're so _infuriating_! I'm trying to have a serious discussion, and you're smiling like my being angry is a good thing, but it's not! It hurts like hell, and I hate you for it! You are so awful, to me and to others, and I can't handle it!"

He let her shout and yell whatever she wanted, because, yeah, it hurt and he didn't like how guilty it was making him feel, but she was inching closer and he could reach out and touch her- that is if he had a death wish. And he couldn't stop smiling. What the hell _is_ wrong with him?

"Why would you let Cerise do that to me?" Lucy shouted, and, Helga help her, she was tearing up just a little. "And you're still smiling! I can't believe I thought this would work. You can't even take me seriously when I'm mad at you. You know what, Avery? I-"

The smile was gone. She saw his face darken and it tempered her anger just a little. She remembered an argument they had had before where he only kept saying "Don't call me that" whenever she called him by his last name. She didn't understand at the time, or now, but from then on she was wary of calling him by his last name. Her instinct was to be afraid of people being upset with her, but she reminded herself that she was the angry one and she was the one who was wronged.

"An-and I wish you had said something and I wish you had done something and now I just wish you would leave me alone!"

He scowled darkly. She became very aware of the foot of space between them, regarding him now with caution. When he just kept looking at her with that dark expression, she got frustrated and took a bunch of his shirt fabric in her fist, shaking him slightly.

"Say something, dammit."

She had meant to shout it, but it came out sounding very small, almost like a plea. He did not look happy, but he shouldn't have been. He shouldn't be angry either. She didn't do anything wrong. She realized she was still clinging to him by his shirt, so she tentatively let go, fingers slowly untangling from the fabric. He let out a sigh at the same time and dropped his head down. Now he looked sad. Finally, he knew how to react to being chewed out.

"I'm sorry, okay?" he said, looking down at their feet. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to get you this angry or hurt you so badly. You have to understand, they've been my friends for years, Cerise since birth. We had been friends for a few hours, during most of which we were asleep. It's hard to just turn your back on your closest, only friends."

She shook her head.

"You're acting like I gave you an ultimatum, like we can't be friends as long as y'all are still friends. I'm not asking you to turn your back on everyone you ever loved. You just have to try. And you didn't. You didn't try, Carson, and you didn't say anything. You let her bully me. That's not what friends do."

"She's my best friend, Lucy," Carson explained. "Technically, she's my girlfriend. I can't just turn on her."

Lucy groaned in frustration.

"I'm not asking you to! How are you so thick-headed? You could have distracted her or you could have told her maybe, I don't know, 'Hey, Cerise, that's not cool, maybe you should not.' I don't know, something."

He lifted his gaze from the floor to her face. She was thankful that her teary eyes had been just that and none had fallen during her angry tirade.

"I know, Lucy. I'm sorry."

She tilted her head and quirked an eyebrow, reminding him of Marcus when he was confused. A skinnier, prettier, female Marcus.

"Carson, do you wanna be my friend?"

"I already told you I do."

She set him with a resolute look, pinning him in place with her eyes.

"Then act like it. I forget sometimes, but in my heart of hearts, I know that I'm worth a little more effort."

She held her breath as she waited for his response. That was the most self-esteeming thing she had ever said. She hoped she didn't come across as self-centered or vain. It was so deeply ingrained in her nature to put others first that her heart ached when she said those words she'd heard long ago from a self-love seminar playing on the TVs in TV store she passed on the sidewalk. It used to play over in her head when she was younger as she wondered if it applied to everyone. Now she knew, _yes, it does_.

Carson didn't question it, or at least, he didn't look like it. He sighed wearily again and assured her, "I know that, Lucy. Don't you think I know that? But I don't know if I can ever be a good enough friend."

"What?"

He looked away from her and muttered out in an embarrassed voice, "Yeah, I'm just not sure I can really be good enough. We've been friends for a few hours, not including all the time you spent hating me, and I've already hurt you a lot. I know more than I know anything else that you are the key or whatever to me being better, being not who my father was. I know I need you for it, but I don't think it's worth hurting you. I'm an awful friend."

When he looked back to her face, it was screwed up in that way it did when she was confused, blonde eyebrows knitted together on her forehead and nose all scrunched up. She shook her head slowly, eyes clouded over like they do when she's struggling to comprehend.

"I don't... I don't hate you."

He rolled his eyes.

"You just said it. You said it hurts like hell and you hate me for it. I don't blame you."

She shook her head, more sure of herself this time.

"I don't hate you. I don't hate my friends."

He scoffed and rolled his eyes again, and it was such a self-deprecating sound that her eyes almost watered again.

"Carson."

She used her fingers to pull his chin down to look her in the eye.

"I don't hate you. You're my friend."

She leaned forward with the weight of what she was going to say next.

"And you're worth a little more effort."

She couldn't read his expression, but she was close enough that she could hear his breath hitch. His chest stopped its steady up and down rising, and his pupils practically doubled in size. If she hadn't known any better, she would have thought he was frozen. When he didn't answer for nearly a minute- though it felt like an eternity- she asked softly, "Carson?"

He let out a long, shuddering breath that racked through his body and fluttered the bangs on her forehead. He shook his head slightly to clear whatever thoughts were clouding his brain. She let go of his chin and took a step back to give him some room to breathe, purposefully ignoring the blush creeping up her neck. He ran a shaky hand through his hair and took in deep, full breaths like he had just run a race. He looked completely and totally wrecked, for lack of a better word. They stayed like that for a while, him collecting himself and her watching. After he looked like he had breathed enough, Lucy broke the silence.

"So we're friends, okay?"

He nodded sort of distractedly.

"We're friends because you wanna be a better person?"

He nodded again, obviously occupied by some other thought.

"We're friends and you're gonna act like it?"

He nodded again, more firmly, and even dared to flick his eyes up to hers for a second before being consumed by his thoughts again.

"We're friends and I knew what I was getting into when I agreed to this."

This time it was a statement. He started to nod before he realized she wasn't asking him but telling him. He gave her a small, grateful smile.

"Lucy?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry."

"I know."

He smiled at her, and she blushed, ducking her head so he wouldn't see. She liked his smile and concluded that she would help him do it more often. His head fell to one side to meet her eyes, and his hair flopped in that way it sometimes does, and she couldn't help it. So she didn't.

Before either of them knew what was happening, she threw her arms around him and buried her face in his chest. He tensed for maybe a second before wrapping his arms around her shoulders and pulling her closer to him. He turned his face into her hair, and she could feel him breathe in deeply. They stayed like that for what was possibly a little longer than necessary before she loosened her hold on him and he suddenly sprang back like he'd been caught sleeping in class or something. He ran his hand through his hair again.

"Friends hug," she told him, more to persuade herself than him.

He nodded like he really needed to believe it.

"Friends hug," he reiterated.

"I should probably get back to the lake."

"Yeah, you probably should."

"My friends are waiting."

"They are."

She knew she was stalling, and she was pretty sure he knew it too. Still, she didn't want to go. Sure, they could always be friends up here, but out there? Past trial runs showed evidence otherwise. What if he was only friends with her here and stayed the same out there? What if this ended up happening again? What if it was an endless cycle that she just got stuck in? What if-

"Hey, Lucy."

She looked up at him. He smiled knowingly.

"You're worth the effort."

She blushed and stumbled back, making her way towards the door without turning away from him, as if looking away for a second would make this nice Carson disappear. When she finally made it to the door, she turned around and then looked back just as quickly. He was still there smiling at her, looking a little bit wrecked and a little bit amazed and a little bit broken and a little bit hers. Her eyes widened at the thought.

 _Mine? Where did that come from?_

Try as she might, she couldn't fight the tiny smile that threatened to spread onto her face. Yeah, he kind of was hers. In a way. She was sure she was smiling like a fool when she got back to the lake.

* * *

"I'm telling you, Hugo, something is up with her."

Hugo sighed in exasperation. This was the third time they had had to have this argument, and Matt still wasn't letting up.

"Hugo, listen to me," Matt insisted. "She's acting strangely. You know it. I know it. Louis knows it."

Across the room, Louis nodded in agreement.

"She won't tell me, but something's going on with her. I think Avery has something to do with it."

Hugo looked up from his homework to the boy pacing in front of the beds in the Gryffindor sixth year boys' dorm.

"Matt, you're being paranoid again. Remember when you thought Roxanne was acting weird in second-year and you made us spy on her for a week before we found out that it was just a cold? It was just a cold, Matt. Lucy's fine."

Matt didn't look convinced.

"Louis sees it. Don't you see it? It's in Avery's eyes like he knows something. You saw it at Hogsmeade. I see it every time Avery sees her. She's got it too."

Louis sat quietly for a moment before saying, "I don't know what I saw at Hogsmeade. I just felt something weird in him when he looked at her."

"See?" Matt said, turning back to Hugo again. "Louis' Veela senses are tingling. That means something. I don't trust Avery."

"Matt, you don't trust anyone."

"Not true," Matt argued. "I trust Lucy, and Roxanne, and you, and even Lily sometimes, and I trust Louis. When he thinks something's up, I trust him and his Veela-ness."

Hugo put his homework aside and faced Matt completely.

"Matt. It doesn't matter if she's acting weird or not- and she's not. It doesn't matter because you are not her keeper. You're her friend."

"Best friend," Matt corrected.

"It doesn't matter, Matt. She's her own person. You can't control her."

Matt groaned in frustration.

"I'm not trying to control her; I'm trying to protect her."

"No, you're trying to control her, Matt, and it's not right."

"Actually," Louis interjected, "I have to side with Matt here. He's not controlling her. He just wants her safe, and I do too. If he really thinks something is wrong, the least we can do is go check on her in detention tomorrow. Put his mind at ease."

Hugo huffed.

"Fine. We'll go tomorrow."

From behind his bed curtains, Connor Fayhan grumbled, "Great. Can you three let me sleep now?"

* * *

 **Sorry for the long wait! Please review and tell me what you think should happen next! And don't be embarrassed. I'm open to anything.**

 **Headcanon time: When Lucy started Hogwarts, Percy got her and Molly a German shepherd puppy. He was so furry and he had such big paws, so they named him Bear. He grew to be past Lucy's waist.**

 **Again, please review. Even if it's just an emoji.**

 **Basically, Lissy**


	13. The Cousins Find Out

**This one's short, especially after such a long wait, but I hope you like it.**

* * *

 _February 16, 2020_

Sundays were lazy. Sundays were for pretending to do homework and lounging around in casual clothing, and that was exactly what Lucy was doing in the Gryffindor common room. At her side, Roxanne sat scribbling notes on parchment and across the room, Lily was curled up next to a fourth year, hoping he would be willing to do her homework if her neckline was low enough. In front of the fire, Hugo's eyes sluggishly wandered over an article in a textbook. From the table behind the couch on which she was seated, Lucy could hear Louis and Matt's hushed whispers as they colluded over something particularly troubling, judging by the urgency of their voices.

They'd been conspiring like that all day, much to her confusion. Occasionally, Hugo would join in as well. This troubled Lily. She didn't like it when the boys, or any of them for that matter, schemed without her.

"Hey, what are you cooking up?" Lily asked, standing beside Matt. She draped her hand flirtatiously on his shoulder, but that was just her nature. Across the room, Lucy could see the crestfallen fourth year begin working on Lily's work. Poor kid.

"Nothing. Just planning our Astronomy project," Louis shrugged.

Matt looked over at Lucy who had turned in her seat to watch their exchange. Lily followed his eyes to her. She leaned forward and whispered something to the two boys that Lucy couldn't hear. Lucy faced forward quickly. She had the sneaking suspicion they were talking about her, but she tried not to think about it too much.

Roxanne looked at Lucy, then over her shoulder at the conspiring trio, and then back to Lucy.

"What's the matter?"

Lucy shrugged and shook her head. She gestured towards the notebook in her lap.

"Nothing. I'm just having a bit of trouble balancing this potion."

Roxanne looked down at the notebook, nibbling on the tip of her quill pensively.

"Oh, that's simple. Let me show you."

Lucy listened with half an ear as Roxanne explained potion balancing, trying not to wonder what her cousins and best friends were saying about her.

* * *

Carson watched Lucy look over his herbology work with busy eyes. He tried to pay attention to the notes she was writing all over the margins of his parchment but her bottom lip was caught between her teeth and it was entirely too distracting. How someone could be so accidentally thought-consuming was beyond him.

He rested his chin on his hand and contemplated her, something he did so often nowadays it practically became a personality trait. He was grateful for her forgiveness. He had never been good with that, but she had the habit of being capable of everything he was not. Like herbology, for example.

Lucy glanced at him in her peripheral vision a few times before saying nervously, "Why are you watching me like that?"

He smiled.

"I'm glad we're friends again."

Her face colored slightly. He recalled the detention before when Wrunn had made her blush like that and Carson had resented that he could never make her blush like that. His ego grew just a little.

"Well, stop," she said, ducking her head to hide her blush. "You're making me self-conscious. You should be paying attention to the paper, anyway. I'm trying to help you pass herbology."

She leaned down over the parchment and a lock of hair fell loose from her headband. He felt the urge to brush it back but worried that wasn't something friends do. That had been a struggle for him as of late. He found himself wanting to do things that he was sure friends don't do. Before he could act on any unfriendly impulse he had, she tucked the blonde strand behind her ear and continued scribbling on his parchment.

She dropped one hand to rest on her knee, right where her skirt stopped. Carson never understood the appeal of the schoolgirl uniforms that he heard about so much in locker rooms and boys' dorms. The skirts were so long and heavy and the blouses, although sheer, were billowy and puffed out in ways that distorted a girl's shape entirely. Lucy still managed to distract him with it, though.

He quickly looked back to her face, hoping she didn't notice that his attention kept wandering. He was positive that wasn't something friends do. He scanned her face, eyes stopping on the lip caught between her teeth as briefly as he could without being painfully obvious. He moved up to her eyes. They were still clouded in thought but not over herbology. She seemed to be gazing through the parchment. Her pencil had stopped scratching out notes.

He nudged her knee with his own, snapping her back to reality to look him in the eyes.

"Where'd you go?"

She was still biting her lip, but now it was more out of worry than deep thought. She shrugged.

"Just thinking."

She turned back to the paper, so Carson thought that was all she was going to say. Instead, she twisted in her seat to face him again.

"The boys are coming to spy on me."

Carson quirked up an eyebrow, silently telling her to elaborate.

"Matt. He's coming down to check on us with Louis and Hugo. Lily told me."

"Oh."

She tilted her head into her hand and propped it up on the desk with her elbow regarding him calmly. He sat back and ran the hand that he'd been resting his chin in through his hair.

"That's... bad."

"Why?"

He didn't answer.

"Let them come and spy," she declared, leaning forward with her hands on her knees. "I have no secrets from them."

There she goes again, doing the things he couldn't, like standing up to her friends, for example. He knew the weight of what she was really doing and what she really meant. He felt guilty again for not having the bravery to do what she was about to do. He also felt awed at the moral integrity of the witch sitting in front of him, innocently tugging at her lip with her teeth, lips quirked up in a happy smile. He was floored.

Every hero needed an antagonist to make them shine all the brighter in contrast to the grimy villain they were fated to parallel. Ever since he first saw Lily Potter, laughing obnoxiously with the entire rest of the Weasley Clan on Platform 9 3/4 as they prepared to send her off to her first year at Hogwarts, he knew. She was it. She was the hero. The precious Potter, the youngest Potter, the female Potter, the only Potter to inherit that shock of ginger hair. The daughter of the Boy-Who-Lived and legacy to the sprawling Weasley Clan through the first female Weasley in generations. She was innately a hero, so her explosive personality added to her heroism, making her a superhero. She was everything he wasn't, famed and fortuned before she left the womb with nothing but a shock of ginger hair and a blessing for a last name.

He knew her well, as one must when it comes to enemies. He knew she was overdramatic and made for the stage, and that she loved to flirt not to get silly girlish love but for attention to rival that of the Sun. He knew she wasn't fond of writing and that her best friends were all from the Weasley Clan. He knew them, too. He knew brilliant Hugo; charming Louis; inexhaustible Roxanne; impenetrable Matt; and little Lucy Weasley, timid and shy, relenting and cowardly. The only of the six not to go to Gryffindor, she was the first Hufflepuff Weasley in ages.

Like all good archnemeses, Carson knew how to get to Lily, how to break down the hero, if only temporarily (because, as we all know, the hero always wins). To get to Lily, test Hugo. To test Hugo, disgrace Louis. To disgrace Louis, tire Roxanne. To tire Roxanne, break Matt. To break Matt, hurt Lucy.

Hurting Lucy was fairly simple. She had flaws for days and insecurities in spades. Poke at her heritage, pick at her house, press at her heart till she sets off the chain reaction that knocks Lily off her high hippogriff, if only for a moment. It was effortless, really. She made it easy. He never bothered to know her much past how to hurt her. He never saw what she was capable of doing.

Now, he sits across from that very same witch, watching her smile for him and blush for him and stand up to all her friends for him. Reader, after that backstory, you know as well as he that he doesn't deserve her smile or her blush or this witch. Not yet, anyway.

"Carson?"

Her eyebrows were scrunched together, a question in her swampy eyes. She was still leaning forward, not very close but close enough.

"How?"

Her face twisted in confusion, nose crinkling. He liked that he knew her expressions.

"How what?" she asked.

"It'd take me years to answer that question," he responded cryptically, not on purpose.

He could tell by the look in her eyes that she didn't understand still. He didn't think he had the time or vocabulary to articulate it all, but he'd try for her.

"How are you a real person? How are you so kind and forgiving? How can you be kind to me an-and forgive me, after everything? How are you my friend? How do you even tolerate me? How-how do you tolerate my stupid soul-searching and my mid-mid-life crisis? How are you capable of so much... so much..."

He trailed off when she flushed a bright pink that dragged his attention away from what he had been saying.

"How are you so bloody distracting?" he finished in a low voice, eyes fixed on her lips unabashedly. Friends don't do that.

"Sorry," she murmured. Now she was very close. Or was he close? He wasn't sure. All he knew at that moment was that he was _so distracted._

 _BAM!_

Carson flew away from Lucy, who fell backward out of her seat at the loud slam of the door swinging open.

"What's going on here?"

Lucy sat up on the floor and answered the angry voice breathily, "Herbology."

Heart racing, Carson stared down three Gryffindors in varying stages of rage. The one nearest him, that Longbottom git, was seething, waves of fury radiating off of him. At his side, Frenchy glared with crossed arms and blazing eyes. Still in the doorway, Weasley- the Weasley-est one- stood looking slightly miffed at the scene before him.

Carson looked over his shoulder to see exactly what they were seeing and his heart caught in his throat at the sight. Lucy kneeled on the floor before him. Her headband had been knocked back, mussing up her hair, and her face was a bright Weasley red. Her skirt had slid up to the tops of her thighs, her chest was rising and falling with heavy breaths, and her eyes were glazed over- most likely from hitting her head on the floor when she fell. Worst, and probably most incriminating, of all, her bottom lip was swollen and red from her awfully distracting habit of chewing on her lip all the time. He swallowed hard, reminding himself that friends don't fawn over friends when they take a tumble and end up kneeling on the floor before you looking thoroughly wrecked. That, he was sure of.

"Herbology, my arse," Frenchy growled, baring sharpened incisors. Apparently, that was a thing with one-eighth veelas.

Lucy huffed and attempted to fix her headband sheepishly. She wobbled to her feet, gingerly rubbing the back of her head.

"We were, uh," she started, still sounding breathless and dazed. She licked her lips and tried again. "We were just tutoring."

Weasley arched an irritated eyebrow.

"I know tutoring and that was not tutoring.

Carson looked to Lucy, deciding it was best if she did the talking. Lucy blushed and explained, "We got distracted."

"You have no idea," Carson muttered under his breath.

"Since when do you tutor Avery?" Frenchy asked accusatorially.

Lucy looked down at the floor like a chastised child.

"Yesterday he asked for my help so I-"

"Why are you helping Avery?" the blond interrupted, sounding angrier than before.

In a voice so tiny he barely heard it- and even then he wondered if it was his imagination- Lucy whispered, "Because he's my friend."

The following silence made Carson think the Gryffindors hadn't heard her. Longbottom's sudden outburst proved otherwise.

"What the hell?!" he shouted. Lucy flinched. So did Carson. "Is this a joke?"

Weasley placed a hand on the angry boy's tensed bicep.

"Hey, mate, calm down. I'm sure there's a logical explanation for all of-" he flicked disdainful eyes at the scene before him- "this."

"No, I'm with Matt," Frenchy said, pale blond eyebrows bunched together like Lucy's tend to do. "I'm confused."

Stealing a look in Carson's direction, Lucy took a deep breath and met Weasley's eyes resolutely.

"Carson is my friend."

Weasley regarded her with analytical eyes. After a long silence of careful calculation and nervous fidgeting, the tall boy finally said something.

"We should talk about this somewhere more private," he suggested. Carson noticed how his dark eyes assessed him when he said 'private.'

Lucy rubbed her forearms and avoided locking eyes with her older cousin when she shook her head and declined.

"There's nothing to talk about."

Weasley studied her a moment longer before nodding. The gangly boy sized Carson up and then led the other three Gryffindors back to Gryffindor Tower, no doubt to go stark raving mad the way that Gryffindors do. Once they left the room, Carson let out a long breath.

Lucy's eyes were wide with amazement.

"Did I really just do that?"

He nodded dumbly, still trying to process it himself.

A smile threatened to blossom on her face. The smile won and split her face in two. He couldn't help but smile with her.

Her loud squeal broke him out of his awe-induced stupor and made him laugh.

"I actually did that!"

Jumping up and down, she danced giddily around the room. Carson watched in amusement as she twirled all the way back to where he stood. She schooled her face into a look of mock seriousness. Clearing her throat, she said in an authoritative voice, "Back to herbology."

She let another giggle slip out as she retook her seat. He laughed, still stunned. _There she goes again,_ he thought, _doing everything I can't._


	14. An Evening Dance

_February 17, 2020_

The next day, she saw Matt first.

They had Care of Magical Creatures together, the second class of the day. He sought her out through the crowd of students huddled around Hagrid. She'd been listening attentively to his lecture on the ethics of Kneazle breeding when a heavy finger tapped on her shoulder. She barely had a chance to turn around before a heavy hand dragged her to the back of the class.

"Matt, what are you doing? This might be on the test."

"Don't even," he deadpanned, leveling her with a stern look. He was hunched over so he could look her directly in the eye. That and the fact that he was wagging a finger in her face made him look like a crotchety old man. She knew why he was here, talking to her.

"I told Hugo there's nothi-"

He interrupted, " _I_ told _you_ that I wouldn't hesitate to hex him if I heard _anything_."

She put her hands on her hips, emulating her grandmother to combat his grumpy senior citizen impression.

"He hasn't done anything wrong."

"Are you hearing yourself? This is Avery we're talking about, Death Eater Avery."

She fought back a childish pout.

"His name is Carson and he's trying to turn over a new leaf."

"What the bloody hell does that mean?"

Sometimes she forgot that her best friend was a pureblood and didn't understand a lot of Muggle sayings. She sighed.

"I mean, he's trying to be good now and I plan on helping him."

The look he gave her would have made you think she had told him she was running away to join the centaurs in the Forbidden Forest and forsake all human civilization. As far as Matt was concerned, that and what she was professing were the basically the same thing.

"Oh my Godric, I know some girls fall for the 'But I can change him' thing, but Avery is not your typical bad boy-good girl type. He is literally a Death Eater."

Lucy turned red.

"It's not like that. And he is not."

"Are we talking about the same Avery?"

"No," Lucy replied, stomping her foot adamantly. "You're talking about the old Carson. I'm talking about the new Carson."

"Poisonous toadstools don't change their spots."

"Matt-"

"Mr. Longbottom, Ms. Weasley," Hagrid called, drawing the whole class's attention to the back of the class where the two sixth years were quietly bickering. "You'll find tha' this information will be on the test, so if I were yeh, I'd pay close attention, yeah?"

Lucy elbowed Matt in the side. " _Yo te dije_."

"Wait, this is on the test?" Wendy chirped up. Everyone quickly started scribbling.

Hagrid sighed.

"I should not have said tha'."

* * *

"Okay, what's gives?"

Carson looked up from his meal. Gianni was staring at him strangely, as were Marcus and Cerise.

"What are you talking about?"

Gianni raised an eyebrow.

"You've smiled more in the past hour than you have in the past week. What happened last night? And don't try to tell me it wasn't last night. I've noticed the mood swings that come with each of your detentions. So don't try to lie to me. What happened in detention?"

Without looking up from his plate, Carson replied, "Herbology."

Carson watched Lucy leave the Hufflepuff table early and slip out the Great Hall doors. Bidding his friends goodbye, he left the Slytherins to their bewildered stares and followed the blonde out of the room.

* * *

Lucy sat at the Hufflepuff table for breakfast and lunch and she hid in the library for her free period. She wouldn't admit it, but she was avoiding her Gryffindor friends after their discovery of her friendship with Carson on Sunday. She didn't want to say she was ashamed because she wasn't, but she didn't think she'd be able to handle the way they looked at her. Not after the encounter with Matt in Care of Magical Creatures. The Hufflepuffs were less judgmental and completely oblivious to the entire situation, so at the moment she preferred their company.

"I just don't see why I can't only take the classes I need for my future career," Bernie said, reaching over Lucy's florilegium to grab another book off of Wendy's stack. The sweet witch had arranged a study session with all the sixth-year Hufflepuffs for the Herbology test on Thursday. Everyone showed up because no one could deny Wendy's smile. "I mean, when will I ever have to use Arithmancy?"

Wendy shrugged and said, "Your interests can always change, so it's best not to narrow your future down so early."

"Speaking of interests," Colin teased Wendy, "where's Rivers?"

The brunette blushed at the mention of the brooding insomniac who never spent a night in his own bed. She shrugged and said lightly, "How should I know? He said he was coming."

At that moment, Leopold Rivers slunk through the library doors, bags deep and brown hair an untamable mess. He took a seat in their circle in between Wendy and Colin, shooting the tall boy a glare. Colin held his hands up in defense and slung an arm around Trudy who just lent into him and continued reading. Mackenzie and Lucy shared a look across the table at how ridiculous their friends were and how obvious they were to everyone but each other.

"Guys, I'm really stuck on this one," Trudy said, showing her page to the group. Lucy leaned forward to inspect the page. "If mooncalf dung is a natural fertilizer, then why does it have such a negative effect on self-fertilizing plants?"

Lucy smiled faintly at the memory of Carson asking the exact same question yesterday. She let Bernie explain while memories of yesterday flew through her mind. She was so lost in thought she didn't notice Bernie lead Trudy into another section of the library to find a book that would better explain it to her. Bored, Colin followed as did Wendy. Rivers jealously went with them at which point Mackenzie realized she was being left alone and got up to follow them.

"You're not coming, Lucy?" the redhead asked, pulling her out of her Carson-centric thoughts.

"Hmm? Oh, no, I'm not. I've got some studying to do."

When she turned back to the pages, however, all she could think about was yesterday. Think of the devil and he shall appear, apparently. Lucy looked up from her florilegium as she heard a loud thud. Carson Avery unceremoniously plopped himself in the chair next to hers at the library table. On instinct, she looked around to see if anyone was watching them sit together before reminding herself she didn't care anymore.

"What's that?" the boy asked, casting a few nervous glances at the other library-goers himself. His knee was touching hers, making her heart race in the most pathetic way.

"Herbology."

"Oh."

She could see his pale skin turning pink. She fought the blush that was threatening to crawl onto her own cheeks as memories of yesterday's detention resurfaced. He started drumming his fingers on the table to fill the awkward silence.

"You know," he finally said, "I still don't really understand how mooncalf dung can have a negative effect on self-fertilizing shrubs if mooncalf dung is a fertilizer. Shouldn't it just double the fertilization? Could you explain it for me?"

Lucy giggled because all of her friends were currently searching the library for that answer.

"That's fifth-year material. We covered it last year."

Carson shrugged, "Guess it just never stuck."

Lucy propped her elbow up on the table and placed her chin in her hand, squaring Carson with a look of disbelief.

"You're a piece of work, Carson Avery," Lucy said, looking the mischievously grinning boy up and down.

Carson leaned over to look her in the eye, noses barely an inch apart, and said, "Then work on me, Weasley."

Her eyes searched his for a second, blood racing in her veins despite how still they were both sitting. He was so close. His eyes looked like bottomless pits, endless abysses. Something about his gaze was magnetic, like a black hole, and she knew she was getting sucked in. She didn't want to be the first to break eye contact, but the intensity of his gaze forced her to lean back and take a deep, steadying breath. This boy would be the death of her.

"So what are you doing later tonight?" he asked casually as if he hadn't just nearly given her stroke.

"Detention," she answered as coolly as she could. "With you."

"Oh, that's right," he said, smirking like he was winning some game she didn't know they were playing.

After searching his black eyes for an answer to his strange behavior, Lucy asked, "I give up. What is it?"

"Oh, nothing," he said, playing coy. "It's just that a certain Potions teacher pulled me aside in class today to tell me that detention would be postponed. We have a free night."

"That's amazing! I might finally be able to catch up on homework! Or find out who's been sifting through my things while I'm gone. I swear, Mackenzie is such a-"

"Actually," Carson interrupted before she went off on a tangent, "I was wondering... if you'd still spend the night with me anyway?"

The black eyes that normally gave away no emotion now exhibited hopefulness and fear. He was biting his lip in his worry, and Lucy suddenly understood why it was so distracting. Either way, she took a second to mull over his words.

"Spend... the night with you?"

"Not like that!" he clarified quickly, and his nervousness made her giggle. "I just... I want to keep spending time with you. I like the person I am when I'm with you."

Leaning forward again, she asked, "Well, what would we do?"

He scratched the back of his head, ruffling his floppy black hair in another very distracting way, and answered, "I didn't actually plan very far past asking you. By the way, is that a yes?"

Lucy laughed.

"Yes, it's a yes. And don't worry, I have an idea."

Carson grinned.

"Okay... okay. So I'll see you tonight?"

The Hufflepuff nodded and said, "Meet me outside the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy trying to teach trolls ballet. And don't get caught."

He looked confused for a second before nodding. She smiled and said, "Lunch is ending soon. You better head to class."

"Right, right," he said, standing so quickly he knocked over a chair. Other library-goers shushed the quickly reddening boy as he hastily apologized and fixed the chair. Lucy stifled a laugh behind her hand.

"See you," he said as he left the room, looking back every once in a while as if she would suddenly disappear. Every time he looked back she would wave.

When he finally left- not before bumping into two more chairs, mind you- Lucy rolled her eyes and returned to her book, trying to hold back her smile. There was no doubt about it- Lucy Weasley was so gone on this boy.

* * *

Carson was hiding discreetly by the tapestry she had told him to meet her by for about twenty minutes before she came running down the hall out of breath. He had been trying to avoid the prefects as they made their rounds because they were definitely breaking rules by doing this, but he wasn't about to give up a night with her. Besides, what would one more detention be anyway?

"Sorry," she huffed as she skidded to a stop next to him. "I couldn't get away from Bernie and Colin. I love them, but they can be so annoying, especially when Rivers is there to rile them up. Honestly, when those boys get together..."

Carson couldn't help but feel uncomfortable when she talked about Colin Wrunn so fondly. He knew the sixth year Hufflepuffs shared a tight bond, but the memory of Friday's detention with Wrunn and Lucy, back when she was still mad at him, set a fire in his veins that made him feel icky and heavy as well as very, very angry. _Calm down, they're just friends_ , he reminded himself. _And we're just friends, too._

He shook his head to clear his thoughts when he noticed Lucy had stopped rambling and was walking back and forth in front of the wall in front of them mumbling something.

"What are you-"

The words got caught on his tongue as a door magically appeared on the wall. _Had that been there before?_

Lucy turned and laughed at his bewildered expression. Grabbing his hand, she said, "Just follow me."

On the other side of the door, there was a gigantic golden ballroom with a domed ceiling covered with beautiful murals high above their heads. The room was circular with giant floor-to-ceiling mirrors paneling the walls and making the room seem much bigger. The floor shined so brightly that he worried his school shoes would scuff it. As he looked around in wonder, Lucy made her way to the center to stare up at a glistening chandelier.

"Isn't it gorgeous?" she sighed dreamily, spinning in a circle with her arms spread out like a bird.

He looked at her with his eyes wide in amazement and answered, "Lucy, this is amazing. What is this place?"

"My dad called it the Come-and-Go Room, but my cousins call it the Room of Requirement. It appears as whatever you need it to be at the moment," she explained, walking towards him. He noticed how brightly her eyes sparkled in the light of the chandelier and how golden her hair looked from inside the golden room. Even her freckles stood out more prominently from her tanned skin as he became hyper-aware of her. The dull grey uniform only made her shine brighter in contrast. "My cousins and I- back when there were more of us, that is- used it as an escape from the pressure that came from being in the Weasley Clan or from stuff like House hate that tried to tear us apart."

He felt guilty for that last part. He knew she was thinking about what he had put her and her friends through in years past because he was thinking about it too. He could never find the words to express how much he regrets the person he was before really getting to know her. Back when he was playing a part, filling in the unnecessary role of the school bully, he could sleep at night because she was just lame, wimpy Lucy, the baby who came along with the rest as a box set. She was nothing spectacular, just a face that rarely crossed his mind if ever and only when following thoughts on how to destroy Lily. Now... Merlin, now she was the _only_ thing on his mind. If he could go back and change how much he'd hurt her, he would. If only he could find a way to voice these thoughts, maybe he could begin to feel less guilty about it all, but all he could do was be a better person now.

"So you would come to this ballroom?" he asked, trying to move the conversation along.

"No, actually Teddy would turn it into this small cabin with loads of pillows and stuff," she explained with a wistful smile on her face. "It was a tight fit for all eighteen of us, but we liked it like that. At least... _I_ liked it like that. Now though..." her smile turned into a tiny frown, "we don't come here much anymore."

He didn't want her to frown anymore so he changed the subject by saying, "So what did you have planned for us?"

She looked back up at him with a megawatt smile.

"Oh, you'll see. Come over here with me."

She walked backward and led him to the center of the room by holding both of his hands. He really hoped she couldn't feel how sweaty his palms were, but if she did, she didn't say anything. She wasn't that kind of person.

"What are you doing?" he asked, laughing nervously again.

She shushed him and pulled them to a stop in the exact center of the ballroom floor. Keeping their fingers entwined, she stepped forward so that she was standing very close to him. He hoped she couldn't hear his heart pounding and echoing off the Victorian walls of the ballroom. It felt like it would pound right out of his school sweater. He could smell her perfume- that was how close she was- and it was soft and flowery like her voice. He decided that it suited her.

Taking his hand, she placed it on her hip and held the other one in her hand. Her free hand went to rest on his shoulder. Another step forward pressed her chest directly against his. Even if she couldn't hear his heartbeat pounding, now she could definitely feel it.

From out of nowhere, music started playing in the ballroom. It was a slow-paced guitar followed by a voice crooning in Spanish. She looked up at him, eyes shining.

"I've always wanted to teach someone to dance, so I thought you would be a nice pupil," Lucy said, biting her lip nervously. "I hope you don't mind, but I think it will be fun."

Snapping his eyes away from her lip, he asked, "Well, what about Longbottom?"

"Matty?" she scoffed incredulously. "As musically-inclined as he is, that boy has two left feet."

Carson laughed that nervous laugh again and joked, "I don't think I'm much better."

She fought back her blush when she looked up at him through her eyelashes and said quietly, "Still... I'd much rather dance with you."

He just stared at her before he realized he was staring and cleared his throat.

"So how does this work?"

"Okay," she said, refocusing on the task at hand, "it's gonna start out slow and then get faster little by little. Ready?"

He nodded, not at all ready.

Lucy took a step forward, so he put his foot back. She smiled up at him and said, "Good! Now I'm gonna step back and your foot is gonna follow mine. Got it?"

He nodded again and followed her step. She did the same back-and-forth move again until they established a rhythm. Suddenly, the guitar and voice were accompanied by trumpets and maracas and Lucy stepped up the game by changing her blocky step-by-step movements to a graceful sway that involved a lot more hip than before.

As she stepped away from him and then stepped back into his arms, she smiled up at him and asked, "Is this okay?"

He nodded again, finding himself at a loss for words as she spun herself in his arms. He knew enough about dancing to know that the man was supposed to lead, but she seemed to know a lot more about this than him so he let her have her way. She basically just danced around him while he repeated the same blocky back-and-forth motion they had started with.

He realized while she was twirling that she was mouthing along to the song and when she came back to him again, he asked, "Do you know the words to this?"

She shrugged, not losing the beat as she spoke, and answered, "Only the chorus. My Spanish isn't as good as Molly's, but I can hold a decent conversation."

"Wait-" his confusion caused him to mix up his steps for a second before she guided him back into the groove, "you're Spanish?"

"Hispanic," she corrected, slowing the dance down with the music so it was easier to converse, "but yes. My mom's family is from Cuba."

"Oh. I thought you were white."

He realized how blunt that sounded after he said it and he hoped she didn't take it the wrong way.

She laughed, deciding to not get offended and instead replying, "I am. Hispanic is an ethnicity, not a race, so you can be black, white, Asian, or anything else and still be Hispanic. The same kinda goes for Latino. That isn't a problem, is it?"

"No, no!" he said, hastily shaking his head. "Not at all. That's really cool."

She beamed innocently up at him again and spun around so that her back was pressed up against his front. He knew she was just getting lost in the music, but if she kept moving against him like that, he didn't know how long he could keep up this "friendship" thing. It was getting seriously difficult, especially when she turned back around to face him and started singing the lyrics in his ear.

An hour or so passed like that, the music getting gradually faster and faster as well as hotter and hotter, and he had figured out how to spin her which made it more interesting than just back-and-forth, but eventually, she exhausted herself. Admittedly, he had been tired out about thirty minutes in, but he was not about to stop her while she was so into it. Even still, he was grateful when she called it quits because he thought he might collapse.

As she stood there, panting heavily in his arms, face flushed and bangs matted to her forehead with sweat, he couldn't help but get a little lost in her eyes. Just a little. Her voice snapped him back to reality.

"Sorry, what did you say?" he asked, just as out of breath as she was.

She laughed airily and repeated, "Was that fun?"

She draped her tired arms around his shoulders, falling into his body, and he decided that she could never know just how much fun he was having. Angling his lower body away from her, he answered, "Yeah. Where did you learn how to dance like that?"

She shrugged again. "I grew up with it. I mean, I love dancing, not that I'm any good. It just comes to me, I guess."

"I guess," he echoed absentmindedly, looking up and recognizing the myth depicted on the mural above their heads: Hades and Persephone. "Hey, where did you get the idea for this room?"

Her muddy eyes scanned the golden ballroom before answering, "It's based on a memory of a dance hall in New Orleans. One year my mom was hired to play piano for a Mardi Gras ball and I got to go too. It was so beautiful. That's one thing I miss about home."

He didn't know what Mardi Gras was, but he did know that he didn't like to see her frown. Taking the initiative, he twirled her around like he had learned to do and she giggled as Latin music began to play again, this time soft and sweet.

They just swayed this time, too tired to throw themselves into it and content to just move with each other. The chandelier was lighting up each individual freckle on her face and he couldn't help but try to count them all. They were only one or two shades darker than the tan of her skin so it was difficult to make them all out, but he was focusing so intently that he was sure he had spotted the majority. He had just noticed one he had missed on her chin when her upper teeth pulled in her bottom lip and that was all it took. Before he knew it, his gaze was zeroed in on her mouth. Her lips were forming words but he couldn't hear them. They stopped moving. It seemed that time had stopped with them as well. Even the music has slowed to a halt. All he- and the rest of the world, it seemed- could do was stare.

"Carson."

His eyes flicked up to meet hers at the sound of his name on her lips. He had always liked that sound. She makes it sound like something good, something right, something worthy of her.

"You're very close," she squeaked, voice quieter than usual. For a second, he saw timid Lucy Weasley from the past slip through the cracks, which was all it took to shake him out of his trance. He cleared his throat and took a large step back from her.

Embarrassed, his eyes flew to anywhere but her. He made eye contact with the distraught face of Hades above him as Persephone left for spring and summer. Carson felt like the god was trying to tell him something, remind him of something.

 _Just friends, just friends,_ he repeated like a mantra in his head. He took a deep breath to cool off and snuck a glance at Lucy.

The Hufflepuff was inhaling deeply through her nose and exhaling loudly through her mouth, seemingly doing the same thing as him. He was glad that he wasn't the only one being affected by this. It made him feel less alone in this agony.

After having gulped down enough air to last her a lifetime, she turned to him and suggested, "We should head back. I don't wanna get caught by a prefect. They'll think we're..."

She trailed off and let the implication hang in the air. He let his mind ponder the idea for a little too long before nodding and saying, "Yes, of course. We should go."

They walked together towards the door. When she reached out towards the doorknob, he asked, "I'll see you... tomorrow?"

She laughed and said, "Detention as usual."

He nodded and echoed, "Detention as usual."

She opened the door and slipped out of the room and he followed closely behind. He felt like he should say something, but he didn't have any words for what just happened in that ballroom. Instead, he just waved and they both went their separate directions.

* * *

"How was detention tonight?" Wendy asked as Lucy walked out of the shower and started changing into her pajamas.

The blonde shrugged and answered, "Same old, same old."

"What did she have you do?" Mackenzie asked from her bed. "You look exhausted."

"Oh, it was nothing," she said with a wistful smile on her face. "I actually had a lot of fun."

She happily climbed into bed leaving Wendy, Mackenzie, and Trudy very confused.

* * *

 **Wow. That was the most romantic thing I've ever written. It kind of made me uncomfortable, but I hope you can enjoy it. I love the little part with Matt in the beginning. And yes, Lucy has been Hispanic the whole time. I feel like I've mentioned this before, but in case I haven't, she is technically Cuban-American and this was not something spontaneous. This was planned from the beginning. Please review with what you thought of this chapter which is obviously just filler.**

 **Basically, Lissy**


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